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WED TO S LUNATIC. 



WED TO R LDNKTIC. 


A WILD, WEIRD YARN OF LOVE, 

AND SOME OTHER THINGS, 
DELIVERED 


IN THE FORM OFH/ISH 


FOR THE 


BENEFIT OF TIRED READERS. 


BY 


FRANK W. HASTINGS, 


AUTHOR OF SEVERAL WIDELY 

! JUL B tA9i 




St. JOHNSBURY, VT. : 

L. \V. ROWELL, PUBLISHER AND PRINTER. 
1896. 






V 


X 


V" 


COPYRIGHT 1896, 
BY 

FRANK W. HASTINGS. 




EPITAPH. 


TO THE EVERLASTING, EVER-PRESENT, EVER- 
DIGNIFIED, EVER-PLENTIFUL AND 
NEVER-MURMURING WEATHER, 

THESE EVIDENCES OF DEMENTIA ARE 
INSCRIBED. 



PREFACE. 


Once upon a midnight roaring, as Mariah 
lay a snoring — 

Snoring such snores as no mortal ever 
snored before, 

My soul refused to slumber, and it wandered 
into the days of yore : 

And I yelled in wildest whispers: 

Can this be the creature I once adored ? 

Here I clawed my auburn whiskers, 
still repeating. 

Can, O can this be the creature 
I once adored ? 


4 




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WED TO R LUNSTIC. 


CHAPTER the first. 


MARRIAGE. 

i|[ARRIAGB is rightly said to be a divine 
institution, but in the happiest marriages 
^^^it requires only about two years time for 
the bulk of the divinity to sort of evaporate, 
and then the poor matrimonial voyagers awake 
to the fact that we are all human beings, and 
some of us considerably human at that. 

By the law of contrasts ! 

No other explanation can be given, why 
beauty and ugliness, brains and idiocy, cul- 
ture and ignorance, goodness and badness 
become tangled up in matrimony. 


lO 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


It is natural to admire that quality in others 
which is an aching void in ones own composi- 
tion, whether the missing link be lovable or 
kickable. 

By the law of contrasts ! 

It too, must be of divine origin, for by it 
many a being absolutely destitute of one hug- 
able qualification, except some physical, in- 
tellectual or spiritual deformity, have folded 
unto themselves perfect gems of helpmeets — 
wretches, that otherwise would have been 
obliged to promenade the byways and hedges 
of life alone and solitary. Meantime the sold- 
out angels gnash their teeth and marvel aloud 
why they didn’t allow them to — when it is 
too late. 

Funny, isn’t it, we failed to notice that 
the creature had deep red hair, and lots of it, 
until the sparks began to fly, and it’s funny 
again that the sparks never fly until after 
Hymen has officiated. 

Curious fellow, that Hymen ! 

O, could we have known in season, that our 
Duckies would some day caress us with the 
fire-shovel, and our Daisies would crown our 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


1 1 

bald heads with a squash pie, direct from the 
oven, how different would have been the 
lurid thusly ! 

But we didn’t until we learned it — not until 
after we had nearly murdered five venerable 
fossils who attempted to tell us — not until 
clammy experience drove the fact right into 
our thick heads. 

Well, it is stated, on good authority, that 
the chief object of life should be the accumu- 
lation of knowledge. 

By the law of contrasts ! 

Undoubtedly that law has been in operation 
for ages, numbering its victims by the million, 
yet of the vast horde who have wallowed in 
matrimonial honey and mire, also that innu- 
merable embryo army who are destined by all 
the slobber of a blissful courtship, soon to en- 
ter the shadows of wedlock, the astounding 
power of contrasts, as a producer of certain 
effects, has escaped observation. Most freely 
I admit it never occurred to me until 
after I had been led to the marriage 
altar by a blushing maid. Then reason 
gradually returned and I endeavored to 


2 


12 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


account for numerous peculiar circum- 
stances in my changed existence ; however, I 
will truthfully rehearse the cold facts and let 
a candid world gather therefrom such crumbs 
of comfort as may be. 

Mariah J. Jenks and myself became one by 
actual marriage ! 

For the purposes of these thrilling yarns it 
is unnecessary to repeat the sweet and sicken- 
ing details which brought about that relation- 
ship. Suffice it to say, that a proposition 
tending directly to that result, was submitted 
by myself to the aforesaid Mariah, and she, 
after proper feminine deliberation and several 
long, softly sighed nays, having the genuine 
yea accent, finally and fully collapsed in my 
arms. 

O — ee me — ee — whye — le — e — dovee — ev- 
er was — ee. (Curtain). 

We were married by the Rev. T. S. Pax, 
Mrs. Pax serving as bridesmaid, groomsman 
and witness. 

Thus simply was the ceremony solemnized, 
yet withal solidly performed. I say solidly 
performed — that I went through the operation 


1^0 A LUNATIC. 


13 


in a substantial manner, is at least beyond 
question. If there is any doubt in the matter 
to Mariah belongs the censure. 

histen ! 

I distinctly answered yes five times to each 
question of the marriage service, besides 
working in fourteen perfectly audible yesses, 
sort of between times, and to make the thing 
absolutely sure I was continually bowing my 
head, about eleven wags to the minute, I 
should judge — ^honest affirmative bobs, every 
one of them. 

But Mariah stood like a piece of statuary in 
mid-winter, during the ordeal, making no re- 
sponse, either by word, look or motion, a style 
of proceeding which I considered very sin- 
gular; but she said later that she thought I 
had done enough answering for one family. 

Well, this was our first wedding experience, 
and the supposition is not reasonable that we 
should go through it as gracefully as a veteran 
in the business Brigham Young, for in* 
stance — or as at fashionable weddings, wherein 
the contracting parties give daily public re- 
hearsals for eight weeks before the occurrence 


14 WE)D TO A. LUNATIC. 

of the real event, Wednesday and Saturday 
afternoon matinees included. 

However, laying all criticisms aside, that 
simple performance has withstood several 
years of matrimonial blizzards and domestic 
calms. We are yet one ; still far enough 
adown the road that either of us can express 
an individual and distinct opinion without 
kissing each other immediately after. 

Not until that hazy period of conjugal life 
is reached and past can one render judgment 
as to the pros or cons of married life, for the 
delightful reason that one at that stage of 
their existence has no judgment. What was 
once brain is now a shapeless, sticky mass. 

But the ship is launched. Onward she sails 
through petty disputes and broken chairs ; in- 
temperance and soiled carpets ; other loves 
and elopements into the beautiful harbor of 
divorce — unless, peradventure, the love aboard 
is of the right make and sufficient in quantity 
to guide the craft into other ports. 

As an amateur husband I achieved the 
usual success, and if society had not been 
constructed on the ridiculous plan whereby 


we:d to a lunatic. 


15 


one must have money, bonnets and things, 
many of my troubles would have been avoided, 
but long since I learned to pass unnoticed 
matters of so trifling a nature. I have become 
so skillful, even, that a heavenly smile radi- 
ates from every crack and crevice of my noble 
features as I chew and try to swallow Mariah’s 
sour bread. 

As a matter of course I always expect a cod- 
fish salad after I have ordered fricassee swine. 
Yet, why allow things of so little import to 
create family disturbance ? 

It’s foolishness personified ! 

With all her failings, I must, in justice to 
Mariah, state that she never used a horse-whip 
on me ; never attempted to make me into 
sausage ; never staggered into my presence 
intoxicated. In fact she was quite free 
from all antics of that description ; but 
in affairs outside the common place, I am 
sorry to be obliged to confess, there seemed 
to be a terrible deficiency in her internal head 
apparel. 

By the law of contrasts ! 

As between Mariah and myself, I discovered 


l6 WKD TO A LUNATIC* 

shortly after regaining my normal health, 
there existed a vast intellectual vacuum. 

To Mariah I ascribed all the vacuum ; to 
myself belong the entire, vastness. In her 
feeble mind lay the fascination which had 
lured a lovely blossom into connubial bonds. 
It was the old story — ^ merely the attraction of 
opposites— which in our case signified that 
imbecility had drawn brains, and vice versa. 

How many times, when I have been giving 
expression to stupendous thoughts — ideas 
captured in the highest realms of mental alti- 
tudes — ‘has Mariah rudely interrupted me by 
gushing forth a torrent of nonsense ! Such 
absurdities ! 

But of that later, and in concluding this 
chapter I will only say that during our court- 
ship I passed many sleepless nights in useless 
worry lest all the fellows would want Mariah, 
and possibly win her ; but now I am wonder- 
ing, in a slight way, very slightly as yet, 
please remember— scarcely a ripple — why I 
or anybody else should ever have wanted such 
a creature as Mariah. 


CHAPTER THE SECOND. 


WORK. 

HE first obstruction of any account ran 
against in our trip arose over the labor 
question, and had I not been a man of 
deep tact, beautiful generosity and a profound 
strategist, in all probability our combined 
hearts would have become twain. 

I must refer briefly to the past — Mariah was 
an heiress. 

By inheritance she was the owner of a farm, 
also proprietor of some cattle, horses, sheep, 
swine, cats, hens, a dog and one rooster. 

For a youth without special advantages, ut- 
terly destitute of any dead and buried foreign 
titles, with even his credit so poor that he was 
unable to get into debt, to raise himself up 



1 8 WED TO A EUNATIC. 

from a common male boyhood, to be the hus- 
band of an heiress of such magnitude, was a 
great scheme well carried out. Yet, in the 
light of subsequent knowledge, I honestly be- 
lieve it would have been much more brilliant 
to have wooed and won some millionaire’s 
only child and daughter. 

I can say, in all candor, trusting that the 
statement will be credited by thinking people, 
I should have loved Mariah just as ardently 
had she been worth millions of dollars, clear 
cash, as possessing only a few paltry acres, 
hens, etc., etc. 

Now farming is the science of lubrication by 
actual perspiration, which in our tongue 
means work, which is likewise extremely dis- 
tasteful to my weary nature. 

Work is one of the evils that must exist, 
and like all evils I have made a heroic strug- 
gle to shun it ; but I regret to say that many 
times my attempts have been unsuccessful — 
in avoiding labor, I mean. 

Alas ! By some curious freak of nature in 
my composition, there was a fineness of fibre, 
a tired feeling, which would not permit me to 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


19 


become ecstatic over anything that contained 
even a suggestion of physical labor. 

I could ride for miles through rural districts 
passing acres of storm-lodged grain, and 
observe the horny-fisted sons of toil mutilate 
the aforesaid grain with an instrument called 
a scythe, rivulets of aromatic perspiration 
rippling, sparkling and dancing across their 
broad shoulder blades, but not a poetical 
emotion would arise to increase the pulsations 
of my steely heart — not a one. 

Even when the cackling of the hens an- 
nounced the advent into this cruel world of 
another egg, I remained calm and motionless, 
unless I was invited, as I frequently was by 
Mariah, to “bring that egg in.” I do not 
desire it understood that I maliciously reposed, 
when property would waste from lack of atten- 
tion — merely this, I believed in economizing 
my vital forces for use in some mighty emer- 
gency. 

To illustrate: I considered it a foolish and 
extravagant use of time and strength the mak- 
ing of seventeen hundred and fifty journeys, 
daily, to the hennery, when, according to my 


3 


20 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


judgment, one trip per day answered all the 
practical demands of the case. 

But Mariah reasoned in this way: an egg 
left in the nest is a “temptation in the path of 
an honest hen and when a hen once gets to 
eating eggs, she’s a ruined hen.” As if a hen 
was possessed of an immortal soul ! 

And Mariah? 

Mariah was positively unhappy unless en- 
gaged in some labor. To her, work was a 
luxury. At 4.15 A. M., she would, without 
apparent effort, wrench herself from slumber 
and plunge smilingly into the daily drudgeries, 
and if by chance there was a spare moment, 
the insane creature would seize an old rag or 
paper, and go tearing up and down the house 
assassinating in a most brutal manner, inno- 
cent flies. 

Oh, to this day, there is a feeling of sickness 
tinged with sadness, permeating my entire 
system as I think of a nature so coarsely 
endowed! What if all were possessed of such 
a spirit as Mariah’s? What would become of 
the world ? 

Her soul was in her vocation. From the 


W^D TO A TUNATIC. 


2t 


greatest to the smallest detail of agricultural 
affairs she seemed enraptured. 

Work? 

Why, because Mariah said “she couldn’t 
afford to hire a man. The farm was not large 
enough to support so many men.’’ 

Strange logic. Didn’t the farm previous to 
our marriage, produce the necessary funds for 
hired labor and a surplus over? Yes. 

Could it be that woman had inveigled me 
into wedlock purely for the labor there was 
concentrated in my frail form, as she would 
buy a horse or an ox? The idea nearly broke 
my heart. 

The perfidy concealed in some breasts ! 

That labor was one of the great necessities, 
in fact the chief instrument in materializing 
all earthly comforts, Mariah’s ideas and mine 
were a perfect coincidence. Our diversity of 
opinion arose not from the fact itself, but from 
the peculiarities arising therefrom. My idea 
of labor was simply this: Tet somebody else 
perform the vulgar deed, I corisider the mind 
with a very small portion of the body worked 
in merely for exercise, as the only object 


22 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


worthy of a really serious life, while Mariah 
preached and practiced all physical labor, 
with just enough brain worked in to keep 
abreast of the rest of civilization. 

Stupidity ! 

But if she had practised her theories and 
omitted the preaching much happiness would 
have been added to my troubled life. 

She wouldn’t. 

Indeed, I do not now recall an opportunity 
Mariah missed of trying to impress me of the 
correctness of her ways. The moment I sat 
down for meditation, endeavoring to evolve 
some project for the elevation of myself and 
the world at large, that moment the meeting 
opened and my sensitive nature was compelled 
to absorb a volley of nonsensical stuff of 
which the following is a fair sample : 

“As long as the stomach of man clawed the 
air for something to eat; as long as people 
persisted in the foolish habit of wearing cloth- 
ing and living in houses and hankering after 
comforts generally, so long had somebody got 
to work. Nothing could be accomplished 
without work. Folks became weak and 


WBD 1^0 A LUNATIC. 


23 


dyspeptic without work. Lots and lots of 
men, and boys too, got to drinking and acting 
just because they wouldn’t work. People that 
didn’t feel any responsibility of life only to 
be burdens for those that worked ought to be 
buried. What was the sense of sitting down 
and thinking all the time, so long as my 
thoughts didn’t amount to anything?” 

She wished the whole tramp kingdom, past, 
present and future, was rammed down the 
crater of Mt. Vesuvius. 

And then there was Thomas Plug! 

(Mariah’s brilliant dissertations on the 
labor question were always brought to a sub- 
lime finish, by flourishing the marvellous 
feats of Thomas Plug before me.) 

Couldn’t I see what work had done for him? 
Commenced without a cent, bought the farm 
and paid for it and fixed up the buildings and 
things and set out shade trees and bought a 
nice carriage and was one of the town officers, 
and, O dear me! Volumes of such frivolous 
ideas, too light for reptition. 

Confound the Plug creation^ anyhow ! 

It is terrible to be misunderstood, horrible 


24 


W:^D TO A LUNATIC. 


not to feel the power of appreciation. I was 
willing, nay even anxious to labor, but I had 
delicate scruples as to the nature of the 
exertion. 

There were devices surging, ever wiggling 
through my cranium which I honestly felt 
were doomed to revolutionize society — * 
thoughts destined to remodel human existence. 
True, I had not as yet put any of those great 
sentiments into shape to materialize for the 
reason that my conscience would not permit 
me to spring upon an unsuspecting world any 
scheme not perfected in all its details, in the 
completion of which Mariah was no end of 
annoyance by her practical notions. For 
instance, suppose just at that point wherein 
Shakespeare causes Hamlet to ejaculate: 

“ Punch, brother 1 punch, punch with care 1 

Punch in the presence of the passenjare I ” 

Suppose, I say, Shakespeare’s wife had 
shrieked, “Bill go and paris-green the potato 
‘bugs,’” at the precise moment he had penn- 
ed the first “punch,” in all reasonable 
probability the beautiful passage above 
quoted would have been lost to the world. 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


25 


The fact is the intellectual and the physical 
and potato bugs, etc., are separate and dis- 
tinct qualities. When ones soul is soaring 
about in the regions of stupendous thought, 
he or she can’t gracefully wield the barn 
shovel. 

But on one score I have no occasion for 
regret. I always allowed Mariah to work all 
she wished to. With touching self-denial 
extending to her the privilege of bringing in 
the wood and other light tasks, which 
properly belong' to me to perform. If in my 
loving watchfulness over Mariah I detected 
her especially despondent, I would immed- 
iately, after supper, snap asunder hometies and 
spend the evening down at the store court, 
thus giving her the additional happiness of 
milking the cows, caring for the horses and 
the like. 

How ennobling such self-sacrifice ! 


CHAPTER THE THIRD. 


1.0VK. 

FTER such magnanimity as I had evinced 
towards Mariah, the natural inference 
would have been that our married life 
must have been a bed of roses — many tinted 
and perfumed. 

But alas for the perversity of the human 
heart, the facts of the case were far different. 
She did not have that reverence for me as the 
head of the family which I was justly entitled 
to. There was something wrong, yet. Plainly 
I had not fathomed all the mysteries of the 
hymenean shadows. 

Falling in love and tumbling into matri- 
mony, though dauby and difficult, is simplicity 
itself in comparison with keeping those fires 



WED TO A LUNATIC. 


27 


of affection burning at just the right tem- 
perature, to last all along down the road 
which requires fifty years more or less to 
travel and which is strewn with diamonds 
and mire and tears and smiles. 

Philosophers are practically agreed that 
“Love is the greatest thing in the world. ’’ 

But like all great things love is not 
properly comprehended by the masses. The 
thing is not studied; is not looked into from 
the right point of view, to produce great 
results in the majority of cases. By humanity 
at large, love is, and means only the concen- 
tration of a certain amount of affection, ac- 
cording to the capacity of the patient, upon 
some object of the opposite sex, which is in 
fact merely one of the smallest rudiments of 
love. 

The sad condition of life in which I found 
myself, led me to thoroughly investigate the 
laws of love, and I discovered that the great 
uplifting principle of love was to love one’s 
self above all and all the time. Strict adher- 
ence to that rule means happiness conjugally 
and prosperity generally. 


4 


28 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


For the first two weeks of our married 
existence I honestly loved Mariah a little 
better than myself, but in so doing I observed 
there was something wrong; that to pursue 
such a course would be ruinous to Mariah 
and the generations to follow. Already she 
had a disagreeably familiar way of connecting 
me with various labors. 

The problem must be solved or down went 
my dignity; my position as the sublime 
figure-head of the family universe. 

In my keen researches I learned that in 
the proper application of love lay the secret; 
the balm which was to sustain my supremacy. 
I reduced this loving business to an accurate 
science, and how beautiful, how majestic, 
absolutely large, is love when administered in 
skillful doses. I must love myself best, 
which I immediately proceed to do. 

Set it down as an indisputable fact, if you 
are going to maintain your dignity as head of 
a family, or reap your share of earthly shekels 
and glory, you must love yourself — love with 
an intensity that will enable you to nobly 
appropriate other people’s interests to your 


WED T'O A tUNAl'lC. 


29 


own good. Sit up nights, if necessary, and 
crawl all around through your soul and wor- 
ship your own darling self. 

Excuse my cringing modesty while I 
extract from my gilded career lucid examples 
to the point. 

Now I love Mariah; I love our very several 
offsprings; I love the world and the people 
therein, with the exception of a few dozens. 
1 love numerous other calamit 3 ^ but the sum 
total of all that love, immense as it is, is as 
nothing in comparison with that unquench- 
able conflagration of consuming love which I 
keep roaring night and day for myself. 

It’s that, and not my affection for David B. 
Hill, which elects me President of the United 
States, every now and then. That brilliant 
oration; that bewitching music; that pro- 
found sermon to which you listened in a 
thrilled condition, and which you ascribed to 
my goodness, genius or patriotism, as the 
case might be. 

Incidentally the reasons you assign were an 
inspiration to me, but the great motive power, 
the unseen force that hustled about and got 


30 


W5:d to a lunatic. 


me there was full blossomed adoration for 
myself. 

It was the pleasure the applause of the 
world gave; the money there was in the per- 
formance; the tickling sensation way in a 
remote and concealed corner of my being, that 
possibly my name would go stalking and 
crashing and making an unearthly racket 
generally, off down through the centuries. 

lyOve of that high excellence does not come 
at one’s beck and call, at any moment, to be 
ruthlessly cast aside after using. No, it must 
be sought after, coddled, vigorously culti- 
vated, and when once attained, firmly held 
on to. 

To raise myself up to the proper standard 
of love I was compelled to pass through a 
most energetic course of training, self- 
imposed. 

For several years, three times daily, not 
less than thirty minutes at each time, did I 
stand before a large mirror and gaze at 
myself with loving, worshipful eyes. While 
so standing I would hug and caress and 
squeeze myself, at the same time talking ta 


We^D ^0 A 


31 

ttiyself about myself in a vefy gentle, cooing 
tone of voice, uttering such sentiments ag 
only one deeply in love with himself can 
utter. 

Often when undergoing this treatment, 
before I became an expert as a lovist, a feel- 
ing of sadness would come over me as I 
thought of those streams of innocent youthful 
love that used to gush forth from my stammer- 
ing soul into Mariah’s ear. 

Love running pure and clear and without 
effort! Love into which no form of selfish- 
ness entered ! Love that does not crawl into 
one’s system but just once in a lifetime! 
Love that seemed to be vanishing with the 
going years, or was it simply changing form. 

As time moves along new phases of life de- 
velop, yet I can but think, had I not worked 
up this self-admiration, I might, with other 
promising people who have never studied the 
subject of love, have found my eye teeth sunk 
into oblivion, and right in the dewy green of 
noble manhood, discovered myself the centre of 
attraction on some hastily constructed gallows.^ 

And so Mariah and I waddled onward. 


CHAPTER THE EOURTH. 


COUNTRY. 

F one is contented in this wofld, it matters 
little as to their vocation or location, 
providing, of course, that the place and 
business is of Such a nature as to keep the 
incumbent thereof out of those places where 
the windows are cased with iron bars. But if 
one is discontented in their work, however 
great or honorable the calling, he or she 
might just as well be jumping about in the 
infernal regions, so far as earthly happiness 
is concerned. 

I did not like farming, because 1 felt that 
nature had intended me for greatness. Some- 
times when hoeing cabbage, or chopping 
Xvood, I would be overcome with the feeling 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


33 


that I was actually commiting a great sin in 
thus burying my talents. If sueh should 
eventually prove to be the case, to the power 
that questions it, I shall refer directly to 
Mariah. Doing her farmwork is enough, 
without being held responsible for her sins. 

She said she didn’t believe I was much 
bigger than common folks, if I was any. She 
much preferred being sort of medium sized and 
having a comfortable home all our own, than 
to being a ninth rate nobody in city or village, 
and living up in the top of some great high 
building, where she’d got to use balloons, ele- 
vators, parachutes and things in getting up 
to and tumbling down from. She didn’t want 
to breathe air over after everybody, and drink 
water full of snakes and bugs and things. 
(That was Mariah’s uncultured way of speak- 
ing of the scholarly bacilli.) She didn’t want 
to be obliged to use eggs that had got to be 
assassinated. A man not possessed of the 
necessary mental requisites for becoming a 
Webster or a Longfellow, could so conduct 
himself on a farm as to become the owner of a 
pair of gingham shirts. 


34 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


Didn’t I remember James Dough? — 
Thought he could be very great if he only 
could get into some place where he wasn’t. 
Sold his farm and went to New York city. 
A hawker got all his money away from him 
and now he has nothing, really nothing. 

She always knew that Jim didn’t know 
enough to even close his eyes in slumber. 

That woman’s talk makes me very tired. 

But speaking of farming and country life 
generally, how little is known of it, as it 
actually is, by outsiders. 

Now and then some author fresh from the 
city wilds, roosts in the shade upon the hill- 
side, of a July morning, with the mercury 
boiling in the hundreds, and watches the old 
farmer on the meadow rasping down the grass, 
and thereupon begins to cackle about the 
glistening scythe, dew-bespangled violets, the 
ever-gleeful bumblebee, etc., etc., and closes 
the song with a low sad grunt on the heavenly 
bliss of the farmer’s lot. 

Regard all such effusions as the outpouring 
of a weak or malicious mind, and if I were 
the farmer alluded to. 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


35 


I would cleave that poet’s body in twain 
And leave his head upon the main, 

To wither and poetise in the rain. 

That makes a very pretty poem or a first- 
class humorous article, but there is nothing 
in it with the exception of the violets, that is 
at all truthful to nature. Even the stately 
bumblebee, with his desires for chewing 
people, is slandered. To substantiate this, let 
the aforesaid poet mow a few swaths on the 
same meadow — hornets’ nest, mosquitoes and 
snakes, included. 

Presently he will be firmly convinced that 
there is a mighty difference between fact 
and fancy. 

Country life as a means of living, is one 
thing, and living in the country merely for 
recreation, is quite another, and whether city 
or country bred but very few people have the 
naturalist’s instinct or desire to become famil- 
iar with the wonderful colors, sounds and 
signs the country affords. 

The average citizen’s observations in nature 
embraces the whole landscape at a glance and 
produces no impression on the mind, unless 


5 


36 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


something a little out of the usual order 
looms up to our visions, like a specially fine 
cluster of berries or an oddly clothed bush, 
when our sleepy souls arise nobly to the 
occasion and we exclaim in a gurgling tone, 
about half way between the bass of a bull-frog 
and the tenor of a screech owl: 

U-o-oh the — the berries! 

My-e se-e those lovely fo-o-ho-o-iage ! 

And there endeth the lessons of nature to 
the general mind. Scenes constantly before 
us, even in the most humble landscape, of 
such grandeur of color and dimensions, music 
so nicely arranged as to volume and accuracy 
in sound, earth and sky so radiantly beautiful 
that the highest arts of man cannot reproduce 
the effect to a satisfied degree of perfection. 

But what makes the cold chills circulate up 
and down my spine is the misleading tendency 
of most all literature on country life. From 
it one infers that all rural people have to do is 
to repose in the shade, whittle their corns and 
gaze at the hillside. 

Don’t get things mixed. 

Here is an author who attempts a discrip- 


W:^D A tUNA^iC. 


37 


tion of a farmer’s life, on “Sunday morning,” 
and it is a fair sample of what I am trying to 
make clear. 

By actual count he uses nine hundred 
words in a genuine whoop over the glimmer- 
ing sun rays, the twittering birds, the vine- 
clad tree, the moss-covered post, the croaking 
frog and sprightly cricket, etc., all of which 
is very pretty, but I suppose I was to learn in 
that chapter about What farmer so-so did that 
particular Sabbath morning. Indeed the 
author so informed me at the close of the 
previous chapter, and here is all the light in 
that line; “The morning chores are done, 
and Mr. X. is ready for church. ” 

Extremely brief and unpretending that 
sentence, yet it is the only inkling in the chap- 
ter we receive of Mr. X’s mode of life. The 
impression conveyed is that he has done 
nothing this morning but suck down in wall- 
eyed wondef the beauties of his natural 
surroundings. 

“The morning chores are done and Mr. X. 
is ready for church. ” 

Eisten while I put into unvarnished Eng- 


38 


WKD TO A LUNATIC, 


lish the actual meaning of that expression: — ' 
Got up, (a work of itself considered by good 
judges a full half day's labor), climbed into a 
pair of fifty-cent overalls; dislocated my left 
shoulder pulling on my cowhide boots; 
built a fire in kitchen stove; cut my finger 
while whittling shavings for same ; thought of 
something but didn't say a word; proceeded 
to the barn with the milk pails; milked; old 
cow slashing the air with her tail in vain 
attempts to murder a sweetly singing fly^ 
succeeded in artistically decorating my classic 
visage; endeavored to sing a sacred melody, 
but when pitching the tune got another slap 
in the mouth from the same tail ; ceased sing- 
ing and murmured some intense thoughts 
suitable to the occasion ; fed horses ; drove 
cows to pasture; run milk through separator; 
pigs got out; a general race ensued.; Mariah 
takes part and wins first money, hogs second 
with myself and dog a close third; breakfast; 
groomed horses and cleaned stables; got my 
shoulder joint back into place by pulling off 
my boots ; cut off and dug out my auburn 
beard, (incidentally Mariah has remarked 


WE:d 1^0 A tUMAl'lC. 


tliat my beard resembled barbed wire in all 
respects but color); peeled off and slung care-^ 
fully into the corner my farmer^s trousseau; 
bathed; donned my Sunday suit, and I was 
ready for church. 

O my poor lacerated heart ! 

Again the general writer in producing the 
conversation of his country characters causes 
them to use expressions in use one hundred 
years ago, and which now are very rarely 
heard even among the least scholarly of that 
class. It's true that agricultural communities 
do not flounder about in a style of expression 
gilded with superb flourishes of rhetoric, yet 
it is also true, that one hundred years with 
this old world ambling along at a 2.04 gait, 
brings about marvellous changes, and while 
we poor children of the woods may not have 
kept abreast of the procession, we have at least 
been within “how are ye" distance, some of 
the time. 

Neither is this rosey-posey class of litera-^ 
ture of which I have spoken to be charged 
entirely to authors ignorant of country doings, 
for some country writers, knowing full well 


46 


WKD A ttJNAflC 


by a life-time association, the difference 
between a pumpkin and a tree^toad, yet per- 
sist in staggering along in the old heavens- 
orange-tinted rutSi 

Only last winter Mariah was invited by an 
agricultural society to prepare an essay on the 
subject, “Farmers’ Wives,” and deliver at one 
of their meetings. I thought I should 
certainly hear in her address the lot of a farm* 
er’s wife truthfully portrayed. 

Well ! 

It appeared that that w^oman had runiaged 
through all the poetry from Chaucer down to 
and including James Whitcomb Riley, and 
every idea that contained the least shimmer of 
a glimmer, of a rustle of a tint of a shade, in 
the meadow% on the glade, or the vines by the 
pines and purring whines over in the deep^ 
deep mines, where hares get away from bears, 
by the stump next to the pump, by doing 
some big jumps, etc., formed the substance of 
her remarks. Just enough originality mixed 
in to connect the stuff. Not a clue in the 
whole essay did Mariah give as to the actual 
lives of “Farmers’ Wives.” Not a word 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


41 


about salt pork and company, chikens with 
choleric tendences, emaciated calves that 
must have scalt milk, churning days where 
richly colored profanity came freely two 
hours before the butter thought of coming. 
Not one tender word even concerning fly 
specks, a science in which Mariah had by 
patient industry become an authority, on 
threshing-machine days. In fact, nothing 
mentioned that distinctly marks the career of 
a farmer’s wife. 

However, it may be safely asserted, that 
into country people’s lives, as into all other 
lives, there meanders just so much (about 
half and half) of sugar and vinegar, and it is 
one of the unsolved mysteries, why, when 
there are millions of God’s good acres, uncul- 
f tivated and unoccupied, on this little earth of 
ours to-day, whereon, by honest labor mixed 
with a brain or two, an independent and com- 
fortable living could be obtained; that 
millions of the human family should swelter 
in all the impurities that poverty compells in 
over-crowded cities. Millions of our fellow 
creatures that do not from birth to death 


42 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


breathe one breath of pure air or drink one 
swallow of actual water who do not even get 
one good uninterrupted squint at the blue 
sky — and still the acres lie unimproved. 

Why is it thus? 

Right here, Mariah rudely spoke out,' say- 
ing; “It was probably because they thought 
they were too large — too large for a small place 
like the country. ” 

• That’s some of Mariah’s sarcasm. 

But, seriously, if I wasn’t so completely 
mashed with myself and my dollars ; if I 
could be positively certain that the other 
chaps wouldn’t be prancing into heaven some 
,^fine mornin'g with a better filled pocket book 
than my own, I should invest a few thousand 
dollars in removing the poor from the cities 
and establishing them in the country. In the 
immediate vicinity of each colony*, I should 
ordain a respectable sized cemetery, that lazy 
and vicious ■ subjects might be buried with 
slight expense. 

I dare not do it. The risk is too great. 

What if death should come stamping up to 
my door some rainy evening and find 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


43 


I was short a million of dollars or two? Ten 
to one I should be unable to procure a ticket 
entitling me to a seat pretty well up in front. 
It would be folly. 



6 


CHAPTER THE FIFTH. 


CHURCH. 

? HE earth, in its annual trot around the 
sun, had once more brought forth July, 
and with it came all the comforts common 
to Hadaistical atmospheres. 

The fatherless mosquito again slumbered 
upon my bed post by day and mutilated my 
wasted features by night, singing the mean- 
time the sweetest and most profane inspiring 
melodies. Briefly, all nature was at its 
height, from the agile bedbug down to the 
soaring hen-hawk; from the sweet scented 
thoroughwort blossom up to the pond lily. 
Verily, all was hustle. The justly celebrated 
new-mown hay also appears — the hay which 
so many weak minded people have become 


WKD T'O a 


45 


convulsed into rhymes over, yet can never be 
prevailed upon to eat a mouthful of— -either 
rhymes or hay. 

Haying— blessed, sanctified haying— how 
often hast thou lathered my body and soul in 
thy perspiring embrace. For thee have 1 
committed several transgressions, for which 
you in the mysterious future will have to ante 
up. Into thy arms, O bewitching successor of 
last year’s haying, I plunge with mingled 
feelings (mostly mingled), as I ever shall 
until my life and common hay shall be no 
longer mixed. 

It is a Sabbath morning. The month of 
July always produces more or less of Sabbath 
mornings — a reflection which is offered purely 
for information. It may seem incredible, but 
the sun shines, the birds sing, the leaves are 
tittering in the breeze; in fact all nature is 
indulging in a good broad grin. Assuredly, 
it is a beautiful day, a sublime streak of 
weather. 

“The morning chores are done and Mariah 
and I are ready for church. ” 

I should add to my previous list of chores, 


46 


WE:d to a I.UNATIC. 


that on this particular morning, Mariah’s old 
lady turkey, who several weeks ago tore her- 
self from those she loved (I am speaking of 
the turkey, now), and in a secluded dell by 
the woods settled down and set on some eggs, 
only appearing in the wicked haunts of man 
for dinner and tea, until this morning, when 
she strode forth, accompanied by seventeen 
young obble-wobble-gobbles, which, of course, 
necessitated quite a little extra work on the 
part of Mariah, I performing the brain part, 
arising therefrom. 

On the subject of church-going, Mariah and 
I are a unit. The only question up to date 
that we have spontaneously agreed on. We 
think but from somewhat different reasons 
that it is a duty to be regular at .church, 
though each of us a member “in good and 
regular standing. Mariah looks upon it as 
a duty owed to this and seven or eight other 
worlds, but I confine my church affairs 
entirely to this world with some select pro- 
viso's thrown in. 

What’s the sense of trying to navigate the 
whole universe, spiritually? 


We:d a tUNAI^IC. 


47 


But Mariah is very peculiar. It’s quite 
plausible that one with a less than medium 
sized soul can keep that little soul in perfect 
repair and have time to spare in bolstering 
up other souls, as Mariah does, but a soul of 
length and breadth and huge dimensions 
generally, similar to mine, requires all one’s 
energies to keep the thing in a fairly present- 
able shape, even for earthly audiences to 
gaze into. 

Simply because an animal has only two 
legs never was conclusive evidence to my 
mind that it had a soul. If it has one it is 
in countless instances of such infinitesimal 
area as not to be worth the trouble of 
cultivation. 

It seems to an unprejudiced observer that 
in all so-called civilized communities, and 
some pagan ones, a series of judiciously gotten 
up funerals arranged on an economical plan, 
would be a decided help towards the 
millennium. 

When we arrived at the church about half 
of the male part of the congregation, as usual, 
were roosting in various attitudes on the 


W:^D Yo A tUi^A^fC. 


48 

church steps, and in front, waiting for the 
last bell to call them in, also to glare and 
stare, and mash, and gossip, but by the exer- 
cise of dexterity and Mariah’s elbow, we run 
the gauntlet unscathed. 

By the way, why is it, in city or country 
church, theatte or dance hall, before and after* 
service, the entrance thereto is always blocked 
with apparitions? There they stand, gazing 
with an intensity of “ horrososit3^ * ’ ! Shiver- 
ing truly heroic; a petfect picture of an 
orang-outang eating peanuts ; apparently 
impervious to cold, heat, rain or snow ; 
always on deck; grand emblems of fool-in-the- 
head. 

And for* what? 

The last bell tang. The choir launched 
out on the Doxology. Those who were serv- 
ing the lyord outside entered now, and the 
congregation, with the exception of a few, 
the very eclat of our society, were present. 
Those few never reaching church, only in 
season to receive the benediction, being of 
that superb mechanism as to require no more 
than that amount of spiritual food for the 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


49 


week. At least, I suppose that is the reason 
given by certain folks for tardiness at church. 
I know from positive experience, however, 
that these late comers are no end of annoyance, 
not only to the preachers and those who are 
paying attention to the services, but especially 
is it a matter of vexation to those weary souls 
w^ho have sought the quiet of God’s house for 
peaceful slumber. 

There is no doubt in my mind but this 
identical Sunday which was destined to 
have been the supreme effort of Deacon 
Felix’s life, was rudely shattered, ruined 
beyond hope, by the untimely entrance of the 
Dane girls. He had just given birth to a 
snore, or rather the introductory strains of a 
snore which measured 178 seconds to its apex, 
and was striking in splendidly on the alle- 
gretto movement which leads down to the 
snapped-off collapse in the finale, when came 
the interruption. 

Mariah said, in kind of a mad tone, that 
measuring a snore was great business, any- 
how, especially in church. 

Besides criticising my church etiquette and 


50 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


paying strict attention to the services, Mariah 
can give a minute description of every 
polonaise, basque, skirt, dress, cloak, blouse 
and hair pin; all hoods, toques, hats, bonnets 
and laces; the length, breadth, width, hue, 
color, age, shade, and price of all ribbons; 
the number of each shirr, yoke, tuck, bias, 
hem, binding, plate and gore; feathers, 
furbelows, and numerous other arrangements, 
whose technical names I do not recall at the 
present moment. I do not mention this in a 
boastful spirit, just because Mariah is so 
fortunate as to be a wife of mine, or because I 
think her mind towers above the average 
female mind, but as showing the vast in- 
tricacy of woman’s brain; the ability to con- 
centrate on various and widely different 
subjects at the same instant. 

But whether considered from the snoring 
standpoint or in the light of the above 
enumerated togglery, the most of us have 
some side entertainment to be used during 
church service. 

It must be extremely discouraging for a 
minister of the Gospel to talk to beings, who 


WBD TO A TUNATIC. 


51 


apparently are incapable of making any 
personal application of divine teachings. 

That inspiration was suggested to me 
several years ago, but I never was vividly 
impressed with its importance until to-day. 
Rev. Pax was telling of a marvelous city, 
having “three gates on either side, “ and as 
the beauties of that wonderful place were des- 
cribed, I recalled a number of my fellow 
citizens who would be entirely out of place 
amidst such gorgeous environments. I even 
felt injured, for as the sermon proceeded the 
parson was actually making room for all the 
human family in that magnificent city. He 
has turned the last leaf of his manuscript and 
is well down on the page. No distinction 
yet. The whole crowd, my enemies included, 
are almost on the golden streets. 

Can the man be insane? 

The Bible is closed, the sermon laid 
aside. Rev. Pax advances to one side of 
the pulpit, pauses an instant, and repeats 
solemnly, “and nothing that maketh a 
lie or worketh an abomination shall enter 
therein.” 


7 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


52 


Good ! That shuts the gates solidly 
against several I know of. 

Liars that any locality might look up to in 
pride, and as for abominations, they were 
distinguished artists in that line. Thomas 
Plug, Franklin J. Saphead, and Pumpkin R. 
Squash were the ones I had especial 
reference to. 

Could it be possible those men were so 
hardened in depravity as not to realize their 
situation ? I gave each a searching glance 
with sort of a sorrowful smile attached to the 
end of it, for appearances, and if you will 
believe it I caught those three hypocrites 
staring straight at me with all the might 'of their 
respective eyes, and each feature was radiant 
with ghastly grins, saying, plainer than 
words could express it, “that fixes him. ” 

Just why people should entertain any such 
ideas of myself is unaccountable. My life, so 
far as any outward evidence shows, is within 
one or two shades of perfection. I have 
always been extremely cautious in committing 
sin to have it invisible to the world. If there 
is anything that is nauseous to my sensitive 


W^D I'O A 


53 


nature it is the absurd way some folks have of 
deviating ftom perpendicular rectitudes. 
Can’t even perform the rudiments of sin 
without making public exhibitions of 
themselves. 

Sickening ! 

When we were going home from church, I 
tried to impress upon Mariah the awful 
wickedness of doing wrong and being found 
out in it. I related to her my observations of 
the day. The unparalleled conceit of those 
men. My sympathy with the Rev. Pax. 
How I had wrenched my brain in inventing 
conditions that would allow my errors to fall 
naturally on to somebody else. I told her of 
the many times I had denied myself the 
simple luxury of profanity and fabrication for 
the reason I could not see my way clear for 
holding her or some one else responsible for 
the act. And as to the classics in sin, why, I 
frequently devoted months of study to a 
single crime, before the situation appeared 
safe for operation. In bringing about that 
scandal, you ought to be ashamed of 
yourself ! 


54 


WEJD I'O A 


Just SO sure as I become eloquent on a sub- 
ject and have reached the climax in de- 
scription or argument, equally certain is 
Mariah to interrupt me. And I have noticed 
with pain of late^ she prefaces her talk with 
some slurring illusion to myself. However, 
she is under headway now and running like 
a. clock without a pendulum, and I am 
powerless to do more than give the jist of her 
lunatic utterances; “ Couldn^t I see there 
was nothing in the world half as wicked as to 
do the way I said. Pretending to be so awful 
good and all the time working up some 
meanness that other folks had got to account 
for. It was just such creatures as I was that 
caused people of the world to talk so about 
the church and church members. She didn’t 
blame Tim Tank, mean as he was, for saying 
that if I got within sight of heaven he should 
get to the gates and inside without the least 
bit of trouble. I wasn’t so cunning by con- 
siderable as I thought I was. Tots of those 
smart games I had chuckled over folks knew 
a few days after who cut ’em up. If she 
couldn’t belong to the church and do what 


WeJd a tUIs^AflCi. 


S5 

felie ought to she wouldn’t belong at alb 
Why couldn’t I be good for the sake of good- 
ness and tty and make the wotld better^ 
Why couldn’t I practice what I had pub- 
licly professed to believe.” 

How much longer Providence would have 
allowed such cruelty practiced on me without 
interference, I do not knowj had not Mariah 
at this instant discovered her calves (not in- 
cluding myself^there are five calves in 
Mariah’s^ herd) exploring the mysteries of 
Thomas Plug’s corn-field. And without 
stopping to consider the best way of getting 
those calves into their own field, she bounded 
over the fence and I after her, which of course 
frighten the calves into running, and we run 
after them, which also increa.sed their velocity. 
But why harrow peaceful minds in rehearsing 
the borrows of that race. It is sufficient to 
say that after one hour’s time, in which we 
went through every bog-hole, everywhere, in 
fact within a radius of one mile, the calves, 
through some strange miscalculation of 
locality, jumped into their own field. Mariah 
and I were completly exhausted spirit^ 


We^d a 


S6 

Uall3^ and pretty well used up physically. 

Reader, did you ever experience the ex- 
cruciating joy, the exhilarating pleasure, the 
soul-testing satisfaction of meandering at a 
2. 14 clip through green fields, over beautiful 
hills, down shady ravines and by the miry 
meadows, in pursuit of wild calves ? 

If never, “ye know not what it is to live.” 

But I am nearly discouraged trying to 
elevate Mariah to the present era. She is a 
good eight centuries behind the times. 


CHAPTER THE SIXTH. 


RKIvIGlON. 

f EAEEY, there is not much difference in 
poor humanity. — Cannibles, Voltaires, 
and on through the other forms of civil- 
ization. If difference does exist, it’s in the 
conditions, not in the soul. 

All are born without teeth. 

All aspire, snicker, cry, die, and, usually, 
are fortunate enough to be buried. All are 
impelled by the same principle. All are 
scrambling, trampling the weak into dust, 
and raising thunder generally, in a maniacal 
haste to get there first. 

Get where ? 

I don’t know. But we all keep scratching 
and clawing and digging and cleaving 


58 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


the sea, earth and air, for something. 

I hear a clumsy tread! The house shakes! 
Mariah enters. 

Holy horrors ! 

Cannibals ? 

That’s what I said. 

Mariah admits I am a fair type of civil- 
ization, neither the worst nor the best, yet as 
between a cannibal and myself she haughtily 
says the comparison would give a number of 
points in favor of the cannibal. That 
apparently is a compliment to somebody, but 
not for me as her wild ravings tend to show. 
She said: 

“ The victim of the gentle man-eater didn’t 
have to languish weary months in gloomy 
suspense as to his fate. No reprieves or 
bouquets to worry about. Sudden death 
embraced him, then the carvist; then the 
cook; then the gaudily attired waitresses; 
and last, but not least, the stomachs of the 
famished household. Thus did he escape, 
not only the agonies of a lingering death, but 
all the dismal processes of the grave. ” 

I believe that woman has got the dyspepsia ! 


WED TO A XUNATIC. 


59 


The misery I had brought upon my victims! 
The hellish devices I had invented 1 I only, 
for the further purpose of my ambitions and 
gratifications had spared their lives. Indeed 
in their death would lie misfortune to me. 
Many a miserable wretch would have, if 
possible, torn himself from my clutch, and 
with unspeakable rapture allowed himself to 
become material for a Cannibal Pie, at the 
same time most fervently thanking the unseen 
powers that a life filled with all the sorrows 
and disappointments contained in the 
schedule should so suddenly and easily 
terminate. 

What wrecks strewed my pathway to the 
heights I How many -forlorn beings I had 
kicked aside in my insane climbing to be top 
of the heap ! What despair in all forms had I 
not caused or seen, yet passed unheeded I 
Because, if I stopped to solace and assist, the 
crowd would pass me beyond all hopes of 
regaining. 

What was a human life, more or less, to 
me ? I must hustle onward, ever hitherward. 
Still in the midst of all this magnificent self 


8 


6o 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


I found ample time to render thanks unto the 
good Lord that I was not like that floundering 
pirate yonder. 

Why, Mariah ! 

All the shades of goodness, all the kinds of 
badness I had adopted as the changing 
circumstances of my life demanded. Nothing 
so high, nothing so low but I availed myself 
of it, in the furtherance of my plans. Bob 
Voltaire, Bob Paine, Bob Ingersoll, and lots 
of other Bob of Bobs could do all that. No 
wonder the Bobs bob right up in meeting, and 
say “Look at the look of us! We’ll smash 
your Bibles and invisible idols into flittereens 
and then euchre ye at your own game. See 
how pretty we are, and oh ! so good, and not 
burdened with a religious strap of any des- 
cription. Ye can’t come any of your tricks of 
legerdemain on us. ” 

It was I who had brought about this 
illogical condition of things. So stupid it 
couldn’t even be worked into a first class 
farce ! 

By a super-human wobble of the tongue, 
I managed here to ejaculate the magical 


W:eD A LUNATIC. 


6l 


words, “it’s half past ten,” which signifies in 
our empire that it is time to feed the hens. 
It produced the desired effect, for however 
great the theme we have under consideration, 
hens rank first in Mariah’s mind. Her 
absence was a necessity to my recuperation 
and reflection. I was weary, and felt that I 
should not live always. 

Great cucumber pods ! 

Was I the universe and all the collateral 
belonging thereto ? Evidently, as all the 
meanness from the Christian era down to 3456, 
A. D., had been directly charged to my 
account. 

Mariah’s intellect is exceedingly lop-sided. 
She is unable to grasp all the sides and bear- 
ings of any question. 

If all her statements were true, ought I to 
receive credit for all the Crusades, the 
Martyrdoms, the butcheries that brought 
this people to their present enlightenment ? 

Who is it that has fought infidelity, liars, 
blasphemers and every form of rot through all 
these centuries? 

Who is it and what is it ? 


62 


WKD TO A TtJNATlC. 


But all that belongs to the past, and it is 
because Mariah clings so perniciously to 
ancient affairs, that our troubles over this 
question arose. When she is the brightest and 
clearest, mentally, which is usually in the 
morning, I am unable to bring her nearer to 
the present than the middle of the 14th 
century. 

Looking back over my life I can in truth 
say that I have manfully shouldered all 
burdens thrust upon me, unless I could 
surreptitiously pile them on to some one else. 
That is simply the spirit of true progress. 
Why trig the wheels of advancement? 

Should I don mourning because the Tim. 
Tank crowd persisted in stumbling over me 
into tropical countries? 

Blast the idiots ! 

Was I' to blame because other people 
couldn’t keep their own dish right side up ? 

Did that woman expect I was going streak- 
ing through this world and into the next 
loaded down with knaves and imbeciles ? 
Thus thoroughly did 1 revolve the problem,, 
looking into it from every conceivable point of 


WEiD A tUl^Ai'lC; 


6 :^ 

vision, Weighing carefully all the merits and 
detnerits, and I arrived at the unanimous 
verdict that as society was constituted just 
now, I was manufactui'ed expressly for my 
own benefit. 

Matiah also arrived, and without invitation, 
resumed : 

“Was Christ all or nothing? 

Which ? 

Our lives, what we actually did, not what 
we pretended to do, where the foundations on 
which rested the decisions of countless 
mortals in regal'd to those questions. 

Be cautious, the issues are great. 

Then the meeting w'as again reopened, with 
special reference to my walks. 

Did Christ’s life and teachings instruct me 
to* close my Sanctuaries and spend months of 
time and thousands of dollars striding over 
deserts under guidance of fascinating Bed-' 
ouins, or peeking down old Pharoah’s 
mummified throat, or basking in ease and 
idleness by the shining waters of Take Como, 
that I might the more intelligently preach the 
Gospel to that poor man who hadn’t eaten 


64 


WEiD ^6 A tUl^A'flC. 


one square meal of victuals for six weeks ? 

Was it Clitist that taught me to heal the 
sick and then with a bowie knife to demand 
their life or their money? 

Was it Christ or B. Young, Bsq., or the 
Sultan of Turkey, or some talented female, 
that originated bigamy ? 

Did Christ or the Bobs first introduce the 
idea of purity of life, purity of thought and 
charity towards all ? 

Was it Christ or some railroad king that 
said the earth rightfully belonged to the man 
who had btains enough to get it. 

Was it faith in Christ or the brilliant 
orations of Robert G. Ingersoll that had 
caused millions of souls to go down to the 
dark river of death in smiling expectancy, the 
gloom dispelled ? 

When we (tramps and every form of 
corruption included in this) literally follow 
the injunction, “Do unto others as we would 
that others should do unto us” — obey it to 
the full extent of its meaning — then plenty 
Would be where poverty now is; then would 
joy take the place of sorrow; then would 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


65 


God’s beautiful world, be to all, beautiful, 
in fact. But she could do nothing when there 
were so many creatures like myself, knowing 
caring or feeling only for themselves. 

Curious Mariah, that! 


CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. 


EDUCATION. 

JlUR eldest son, Richard, by name, but 
known only as Dick, has attained unto the 
^ venerable age of fifteen years.- Already he 
has evinced a marked tendency for avoiding 
labor. Yet Dick is decidely brainy. He 
can jump 87 feet high, turn a triple somer- 
some-thing while descending, and land either 
end up. 

His intellect is really marvelous, and as to 
running — why, when he was only four years 
of age, Mariah couldn’t keep within speaking 
distance of him if she happened to be flourish- 
ing a birch stick at the time. By hard study 
and close application, his running is now 
astonishing. I am not quite sure, but I 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 67 

think he has a record of some hours a mile. 

The profundity enclosed in that boy’s 
head has been the source of a vast amount of 
worry to me. 

His throwing of an iron bar meets with 
deafening applause everywhere, so that I 
have feared his head would literally burst, 
from brain pressure. 

By sheer mental effort, and his boot-heels, 
he has arisen to be the first chief in our foot 
ball team. Our social position may have been 
a slight advantage to him, but he is entitled 
to the most of the credit. 

And so fond of study ! Why, last week 
Dick and his warriors played a match game 
of foot ball with the Squashly fellows, and he 
returned with two of their bleeding scalps 
dangling from his belt, much to the pride of 
his mother and myself. 

He would have brought the bodies, too, but 
the parents’ thereof, with much tearful plead- 
ing, prevailed upon him to let the remains 
remain. 

But it is needless to enumerate more of his 
many startling intellectual feats. There has 


9 


68 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


been no doubt in my mind for years, that 
could I give the boy the benefit of a base-ball- 
college education he would eventually make 
a big scratch on this era. 

Money was an actual necessity in carrying 
through a project of that kind. Tomahawks, 
oars, boots, etc., are expensive, and my pride 
would not permit me to send a boy to school 
unless he was fully equipped, for the most 
advanced studies. But Mariah keeps the 
money ! If she took kindly to the idea of 
sending Dick to college, all would be well. 
If otherwise, the dazzling aspirations of a 
brilliant son and the fond dreams of an 
indulgent father must tumble to the earth, 
Lucifer fashion. 

I wish here to digress briefly for the pur- 
pose of adding emphasis to the outrageous 
blunder of my life, viz: Allowing myself to 
be bound in wedlock before I had secured a 
perfect legal title and right to all of Mariah’s 
property. In those bright, cooing days of 
courtship, had I been possessed of sufficient 
foresight to have manfully said, “Mariah, I 
cannot trust my life in your keeping until 


Wl^B TO A LUNATIC. 


69 


after all your valuables are made over to me,’* 
she would have given them without 
hesitation rather than to have lost a bud of 
such promise, but 1 didn’t give vent to any 
ideas of that nature until the designing 
creature had me yoked up tight and fast in 
matrimony, and then, not the shred of a cent 
in my own name could or did 1 get. 

For this egregious omission not only I but 
posterity must suffer. 

Young man, standing on the yawning brink 
of matrimony, gather wisdom from my folly. 
Profit by my mistake before it is too late ! 

And my worst fears were fully realized in 
the matter of Dick’s college project, for no 
sooner had I broached the subject of properly 
educating Dick, than Mariah proceeded to 
deluge me with insanity of the rankest 
description. Indeed, I think this is the most 
severe attack she has had. 

“Education !” she said. She thought it was 
about time somebody was educated up to 
work. There wasn’t an American boy or girl 
in the country that one could get to work in 
the house or on the farm. 


70 


WiSD I'O A tUI^ATrC. 


Why? Because the children have been t(50 
long taught, by fond parents and tender 
teachers, how much they resemble Daniel 
Webster, and how if they study real hard, 
sometime they will become great, like 
Webster. 

The peculiarities of Dan^s head gearing 
have been kept a profound secret from the 
little lellow. 

Dan had brains [ which is a mighty factor 
in the circus, called life. However, by the 
above process, all the boys and girls are 
hustling up the ladder of wealth and fame 
in cities and villages. A cursed delusion that 
was filling the world with professional men 
and women of the fourteenth class^ by simply 
discouraging the humbler callings of life. 

When folks settled down and did what 
God intended them to do, instead of trying 
all the time to crawl in where they didnT 
belong, then she should have some faith in 
the present system of education ; but what 
was the sense* of trying to make a great some- 
thing out of an average sized nothing. (I was- 
glad that Dick was not present). Then there 




n 


Was the cost of books, and— ^ books-— YeSj 
books. 

I am unable to say what Matiah meant by 
books, but quite likely she thinks books are 
Used in modern schools, she is so densely 
ignorant 1 Be that as it may, if books were a 
necessity in receiving a college education, an 
additional obstacle had been rudely cast into 
Dick’s path of glory. 

Did that woman expect a boy of Dick’s 
scholarly attainments to be dawdling around 
amongst books ? 

It must be one of Mariah’s profound jokes. 

But this much I gained by the interruption. 
No further allusion was made to books, for 
either through a slip of memory or a 
purposely changed course of reasoning, Mariah 
continued in this strain: 

lyife was too short for an individual to 
attempt to know every thing, even if that 
person was mentally equal to it. Then why 
couldn’t people be educated with some 
reference to their work in life, and why 
couldn’t that work in life, in each individual 
case, bear some resemblance to the natural quaD 


^2 


^6 A tUNAfie. 


ifications of the youth ? Thousands of young 
people turned loose in this country every 
year with heads filled up with Greek rootS) 
Hebrew rot and lots of other decomposed stuff 
that has about the delation to an earthly 
existence as eating rattlesnakes has to writing 
a first class poem. 

Not five per cent of this highly educated 
army had the remotest idea of the require-^ 
ments of actual life ; did not know that the 
average life was composed entirely of the 
simple ingredients, btead, butter and molasses, 
in the securing of which something had got to 
be done by somebody* That something and 
those somebodies in the majority of in-^ 
stances must be small work in small spheres. 
Hess than one per cent of these college-bred 
monstrosities arose above the ordinary in this 
world’s affairs. They couldn’t ! Why ? 
because they had only ordinary mental 
endowments, and if they had a part of a 
brain, more or less, the positions of greatness 
are not sufficiently numerous to accommodate 
them. The supply, such as it is, exceeds the 
demand. It was better to be a fair to medium 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


73 


bottom of something than a useless idiot half 
way between heaven and earth. And so the 
deluded creatures are ground out year after 
year, in increasing numbers, filled up to over- 
flowing with that beautiful but abominable 
theory that a person has only to squat down 
in the current of human events and sweetly 
wait until their education boosts them into 
fame. Too cultured to hoe potatoes or wield 
a dish cloth, or play on an anvil, and not 
enough brains to get where they think they 
belong, and consequently doing nothing 
through their earthly existence but dreaming 
and cursing an unappreciative world. 

When will Mariah cease her mad ravings ? 

And yet the youth are not responsible for this 
state of things. These malicious effects were 
produced wholly by unwise parents and 
ambitious teachers, in advocating such 
fabrications as this, “That one becomes what- 
soever he wills,” and the like, which are 
much worse than a lie. 

Millions of lives can testify that owing to 
just that kind of bosh being firmly impressed 
upon their youthful minds, their lives have 


74 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


been a comparative failure — lured to un- 
happiness by attempting to do that for which 
they have no special aptitude. 

Fighting against nature and producing 
doctors, ministers, musicians, lawyers, etc., 
that worked more positive injury to their 
respective professions then their uncircumcised 
carcasses — including head — were worth. 

All the schools in Christendom couldn’t 
make a small man out of Abraham Lincoln, 
neither could the aforesaid schools make a 
Lincoln out of a piece of common clay. 

“But, Mariah, shouldn’t young people 
aspire?’’ “Of course they should aspire; but 
let those aspirations be in the line of common 
sense. What reason is there in compelling 
a no-legged boy to become a tight rope per- 
former, or driving a youth through all the 
humdrums of a musical education who 
couldn’t distinguish the difference between a 
musical tone and a plain everyday extract of 
July thunder, or thinking a blood-curdling, 
hair-lifting orator could be manufactured out 
of mediocrity ? ” 

Such muck ! Now, as to our Dick, she 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


75 


wanted him educated ; most certainly she did ; 
but she objected to having him educated out 
of what nature de.signed him to be. Didn’t 
want him droning through life, doing nothing, 
because he couldn’t do something big. 

The accumulation of knowledge beyond the 
requirements of his position, as a recreation 
or as a matter of culture, were commendable 
so long as those studies co-operated with his 
work and elevated his vocation. 

The time was coming when we shouldn’t be 
present to fight Dick’s battles for him. Then 
let us prepare him for that battle, which, if 
ordained by life’s mysteries to be a small one, 
shall be fought creditably, manfully, believing 
humbly that in God’s great machinism, the 
most insignificant pin plays equally an 
important part as the massive shaft, in the 
calculations of the all-wise author. 

Exit Mariah — having, as usual, evaded all 
points bearing any relation to the question. 

Poor Dick 1 

How could a boy possessed of such a 
mother ever become President of these United 
States, or a Vanderbilt or Queen of England ? 


lO 


CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. 


PRAISK. 

LOVE to be praised, not because I believe 
in applying that soothing slobber to other 
people, but because I think I am worthy of 
praise. Yet how many times has my aching 
soul been cruelly denied that solace. 

In fact, in many instances, I have been 
literally obliged to ask people if they didn’t 
consider me pretty, or graceful, or intellectual 
or awful good, and generally far superior to 
anybody else they happened to be acquainted 
with, so reluctant is humanity to render unto 
Caesar that calamity which justly belongs 
to me. 

It’s a magnificent plan, this asking of 
questions, when judiciously carried out ! Of 


to a tOl^ATlC. 


77 


course the questions must be put in direct 
form, thus giving no chance for evasion in the 
answers. Very rarely do you meet with a 
person so rudely blunt as to answer “no,” to 
the direct question, “do you think I am 
pretty?” 

Aside from Mariah, I have yet to find that 
person who says “no” to the inquiry, “then 
you think I am very brainy, do you not?” 
But be very careful in wording the query or 
you will get an implied censure in place of 
the expected compliment. 

Do I praise other people ? 

How you startled me ! I didn’t suppose 
there was anybody in the wide 'world, except^ 
ing Mariah, vrho could propound such an 
absurdity, but I find on looking around that 
she is busy with a consumptive lamb, and 
happily has not yet got on to my praise 
enterprise, so 'assuming that the question was 
put in all seriousness, I will answer it frankly, 
and in accordance with the spirit of true 
progress: Yes, under certain conditions. 

Let any and every piece of human endowed 
clay, despicable or otherwise, with whom I 


78 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


am acquainted, lie firmly clutched in the arms 
of cold death; dead beyond all hopes of 
resuscitation — -so dead that there is not a 
shadow of doubt in my mind but there is 
going to be a real funeral — I readily dis- 
cover sundry virtues possessed by that hand- 
ful of dust, and I begin to cackle about and 
magnify upon those virtues until really there 
is a smile on the face of the corpse. 

That’s the way I do it, and why ? Because 
all that talk is harmless now — very much so. 
He is an angel now in another sphere of 
action, and can’t avail himself of any of these 
points to gain ascendency over me. But don’t 
be too hasty in your eulogies. He may 
possibly revive, in which ease it would be 
very embarrassing to harmonize your previous 
and post-mortem remarks. 

A sad experience taught me that Frank- 
lin P. Saphead was my enemy, openly de- 
clared, at every turn and corner of life— as I 
was his. I used to devote a certain portion 
of each day preparing mean things to say 
of him. 

Well, he died— died suddenly. In fact 


WnT> TO A tUNATiC. 


79 


dropped dead while at work. At any rate he 
was so sufficiently dead that his funeral 
obsequies were nearly finished, when, to the 
consternation of all, he stepped out of the 
casket, shook himself, and is a well man to- 
day, and solely on the strength of the good 
things I said of Mr. Saphead as a corpse, 
Mn Saphead, as a living candidate for town 
office, won the election over me. It was a 
dearly purchased lesson, but it has stayed 
by me. 

Wait until after the burial, before you pour 
out any praise, is the only absolutely safe rule. 
Or, better yet, wait until after the life in- 
surance company admits he’s dead. 

And as to speaking in plaudatory terms of 
a real live person, it’s simply a piece of con- 
summate idiocy, not worthy a moment’s 
thought. 

In the fresh simplicity of young manhood 
that knowledge was thrust upon me. No 
sense in assisting other people, by praise, into 
some position you are striving to get yourself. 
Frequently I have been able to knock down a 
fellow, by various ignorings of his attempts, in 


86 


W^D I'O A 


such a way that he has stayed knocked dowtl 
and completely out of my path to earthly 
glory. 

Of course there are creatures occasionally 
of such audacious makeup and so unrefined 
generally that they havn’t sense enough to 
lie quietly after being poked over — up and at 
it again as if nothing unusual had happened, 
kegular beasts ! 

I can conceive of only one possible excuse 
for speaking in praise of a living person, and 
that is of such a Vapory nature that I blush 
in stating it, viz: — -When I can tickle up 
somebody to do me a favor, some work or feat 
wherein it is a necessity for me to have out- 
side assistance in the accomplishment of a 
scheme, I speak a few words of flattery, not 
praise. But even in this form, as in all 
matters pertaining to the subject, the utmost 
delicacy is required, because the almost daily 
changes in one’s fortunes make it extremely 
hazardous to render unto others approbation. 

To-day I may coddle a person to do me a 
favor, by bolstering him up in a position that 
by tomorrow I shall want myself, so consider* 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


8l 


ing the difficulties which surround the praise 
question, it is advisable to steer clear of the 
whole thing, unless one is very skillful. 

“You villian ! “ 

Mariah said that, and how it grieves me to 
confess that she now frequently refers to me 
by such terms of endearment. But she has 
me cornered and my system must again be 
saturated with ancient history : 

“Didn’t I know that all really noble 
natures were ever ready, even anxious to give 
praise to deeds of worth, and why shouldn’t 
they be ? When a man, woman or child per- 
forms a commendable work or tries to do well, 
why not give them the encouragement of 
‘well done,’ thus giving them renewed 
strength to fight greater battles ? How many 
poor wretches have sunk down in despair, 
because their earlier attempts receive no token 
of appreciation ! Those attempts might have 
been, undoubtedly were crude, yet bearing 
unmistakable evidence of honest, painstaking 
endeavor, still the courage to further struggle 
had been knocked down forever, because no 
cheering word had been spoken. Why not 


82 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


lift the clouds from a fellow-being’s' soul and 
let in the healthful sunshine of kind words, 
loving sympathy ? This hanging around 
graveyards, singing praises to deaf ears was 
toe contemptible for expression — meanness 
personified. ” 

It’s an absolute impossibility for that 
woman to consider any question in the light 
of the 19th century, and as to praise, she will 
praise anything and everybody excepting my- 
self. Why, this morning our horse, by a 
premature elevation of his hind feet, came 
within one-eight of an 'inch of scattering my 
colossal brain over seven hemispheres, where- 
upon Mariah rushed up to him and began 
petting him, and telling him how noble, how 
intelligent he was ! 

Why is it that Mariah never agrees with 
me ? 


CHAPI'BR THE NINTH. 

t;^mpkranck. 

t iTH the exception of eating and drinking, 
^ I am a strictly temperate man. The 
feverish excitements of the age in which 
we live produce no immoderation in my mode 
of living. Tet the crowd hasten on, pushing 
and elbowing, what do I care. We all 
eventually arrive at the cemetery. But I do 
love to eat and I have a genuine affection for 
drinking, it is so pleasing^the sense of 
fulness. 

I love rum for a variety of reasons, but 
probably the greatest satisfaction I derive 
therefrom arises from my intense patriotism, 
my loyalty, my earnest desire to keep this 
government on a solid financial basis. 


II 


84 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


As I have observed this nation marching 
gloriously into debt — a little deeper each 
year — I have made strenuous efforts to keep 
the whiskey revenue up to former 3^ears. 

In fact, so great is my love of country, that 
many times I have filled my stomach so full 
of alcohol that it literally overflowed, purely— 
try to believe this statement — for the purpose 
of enriching the national treasury. If it 
wasn’t for that I should never touch the stuff, 
only as I am obliged to swill down a few 
glasses of wine, to show my respect to high 
society, and then just enough to give a 
sparkling lustre to my eye and tinge my 
imagination with brilliancy and convince the 
boys that I belong to modern progression. 
But generally those times are followed by a 
morning headache, which sadly interferes 
with my doing an honest citizen’s duty with 
scythe or pitchfork, so that to relieve the pain 
and not lose any time in the work the kord 
has appointed me to do, I take a good stiff 
drink of unreduced whiskey, which in its 
tussle with the headache so wrenches my 
organization that I am obliged to take a 


W^D I'D A LUNAI^IC. 85 

couple of drinks more to help my system re- 
cover from the shock incurred by curing my 
pain, which many times produces a chill that 
may lead down to consumption or pneumonia 
and death, and the thought of my wife and 
children left without the protection of my 
mighty arm drives me to rum again — -wholly 
for their precious sakes. 

And then I have an abject horror of con- 
tagious diseases to guard against, which I 
always have a respectable sized prescription 
of alcohol ready to apply internally, should I 
spy any bacteria walking about, which I 
frequently do discover, and immediately in- 
sert into my being a liberal dose of the pre- 
ventive, (as a preventive it requires nearly 
double the quantity used in ordinary ailments, 
or in the same proportion as used in a first- 
class fishing excursion), which vSeems to 
arouse the envy of a very peculiar digestive 
apparatus attached to my stomach, so that I 
am compelled to take some stimulant, before 
and after eating, which I have noticed brings 
on a feeling of uneasiness, superinduced by 
overwork, which can only be relieved by 


86 


WEJD TO A tUNATIC, 


swallowing lager beer, which again induces 
that headache, which I proceed to medicate 
for in the usual way, etc., etc. 

When I began this chapter I honestly sup- 
posed I was what might be termed a very 
moderate drinker, but after telling candidly 
the only occasions^ with the exception of 
when I am engaged in fishing or politics, in 
which I ever allow myself to indulge in in- 
toxicating drinks^ I must, in justice to myself^ 
add that I am a temperance man, having 
learned by this means that I use it only in 
case of sickness. 

Speaking with respect to strict accuracy, I 
should not probably be classed a total ab- 
stainer, yet, nevertheless, as a man pretty 
strongly mixed up in temperance work. 

No one can hold the drinking habit more in 
abhorrence, than myself, when it is entered 
into by people of good health, merely for 
amusement. 

Guzzling the stuff night and day, and there- 
by surrounding themselves and families with 
all the squalor and desolation contained in 
the list, and doing nine-tenths of the crimes 


W^D ^0 A tUNATIC. 


87 


and gathering unto their estates all the 
poverty not previously engaged — =sort of Tim 
Tank style. 

Why, that man has reached such a stage of 
degradation that he hasn^t any sense of pride 
left ; so low that he won’t even chew cubebs 
or cardamon seeds to purify his breath. 

That condition of things, of course, has 
no application to you and I, because we are 
invalids, and moreover Mariah refuses, point 
blank, to have her property turned down any 
man’s throat -“indeed 1 have several times 
been compelled to get into debt for rum to 
protect my health and shield my family from 
contagious sickness, which I regret to say, 
like many other duties I have performed 
solely for the benefit of others, has received 
no appreciation from her who solemnly 
promised to cherish me through all kinds of 
weather, until my noble heart should cease to 
wobble. 

But she is coming. Reader, accept in 
advance my sympathy for what we shall be 
obliged to hear from that woman on this sub-- 
ject. She is a professional crank along 


88 


WEJD TO A tVl^ATlC. 


all lines, but on temperance words fail me ! 

However, while Mariah is working herself 
Up to the proper oratorical pitch, (it usually 
takes her from three to five minutes), I will 
relate an incident which illustrates, though 
feebly, her ideas. 

Hast winter a horrible cold was suddenly 
thrust upon me. So suddenly and violently 
was I taken that I dare not go to my medicine 
case, which, for convenience, I kept in the 
barn. Mariah admitted that my condition 
Was such that I required a little alcohol in 
some form. 

Well, she had a spoonful of brandy hid 
about the house, to be used in cases of 
necessity, which she. at once produced, and I 
lolled back in the chair, supposing, of course, 
that she would lovingly hold my hands and 
gaze angel-like into my eyes while I drained 
the contents of the bottle. As this cosey 
picture floated before my mind’s eye I believe 
I never felt such adoration for Mariah. Was 
ever man before blessed with such implicit 
wifely confidence ? 

That was all a dream, pleasant but deceitful. 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


89 


What actually occured, was this: She 
poured out of the bottle one drop — counted 
it — into a quart dish half filled with water, 
and after stirring the mixture well, she poured 
two drops — I counted them, also — of the 
brandy and water on to a lump of loaf sugar, 
and told me to take a small nibble of the 
sugar once an hour, or oftener, if I really 
thought it necessary. 

But hear her: 

“God pity me, and every woman who has 
a husband like mine. A husband, who 
deliberately, for his manhood, substitutes a 
bloating, blaring, staring, poisonous drink; 
who feels none of the responsibilities of life 
towards God and his fellow-creatures; who 
drags those whom should be dearest to him 
through a literal hell. Halt ! before it is too 
late ; before all the refined feelings of nature 
are gone forever. How did I expect to feel 
well when I was eating until I couldn’t see 
and drinking rum and bumming around nights? 
A temperate life and clean habits was the 
greatest stimulant ever manufactured. “ 

That was all Mariah said. 


90 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


There is a mystery in connection with this 
which I am unable to fathom. She is becom- 
ing extremely brief of late, ‘and just a trifle 
personal. 


Nott. — tn enumerating the occasions when t use stimu- 
lants, I omitted to state, that in times of sorrow I drink to 
drown them, and being a man by nature given to hielancholyj 
my sorrows are frequently of such siie that it requires large 
quantities of rum to completely cover one trouble. As a 
beverage, I am proud to say I never touch the stuff. 


CHAPTER THE TENTH. 


KNTKRTAINMKNTS. 

^|T doesn’t take but a mighty little to amuse 
some people. I am personally acquainted 
^ with several of that kind. But that little, 
those people are just as anxious to partake of, 
as some other people are to attend a grand 
concert or a circus. 

Here is a fellow that gets as much solid 
satisfaction out of seeing somebody else slip 
down as you get out of a number one lecture. 
Probably, a plain every-day tumble-down 
wouldn’t be a source of speci*al gratification to 
you, neither would the lecture afford the 
other chap much comfort, but take away the 
lecture and the tumbling down and there is 
something lacking in each of your lives. One 


12 


92 


\ WED TO A EUNATIC. 


must have amusement, diversion, entertain- 
ment, and what constitutes those things is a 
matter of opinion, of taste, of education. 

When listening to a Symphony orchestra 
concert you have felt yourself being wafted 
into a land where you didn’t belong by the 
harmony of classical strains, or have felt your 
hair raising and the cold chills creeping down 
your spine, under the orator’s power, or have 
gone all to pieces over an elegantly written 
poem. Ydu, I say, while under those 
influences, have entirely forgotten that any or 
all of those performances create in me only a 
sleepy feeling; that I, in order to get into 
those exalted regions with you, must listen to 
a jig fiddler, or a clown, or read a parody. 

Which is the greater, classics or jigs, 
orators or clowns, poetry or sells? 

In the majority of cases it’s all a matter of 
culture, of circumstance. Without any refer- 
ence to quality, there are a lot of us here, and 
our grade of entertainments, whether high, 
medium or low, and our capacity for enjoy- 
ment of the same, depends largely on our 
situation in life — on what we are familiar with, 


WKD TO A TtJNATiC. 


93 


The poor boy is just as liable to have the 
breadth of soul necessary to the appreciation 
of fine things, as the rich one, but he hasn’t 
the me^ns to gratify his high tastes, and so he 
looks to cheaper things for diversion and his 
soul contracts to meet the requirements of the 
conditions. There was no chance, no oc- 
casion for the expansion of that soul. 

By the way, this business of contraction or 
expansion of souls is whose fault, yours or 
mine? Am I to be censured for going into 
raptures over what would be perfect torture to 
you, and vice versa? 

But as I was saying, the human race 
hankers after some kind of a circus, and it 
has been scientifically demonstrated that 
country people are a species of the human 
family; that they are just as good, just as 
bad, just as great, that is, in proportion to 
their numbers and opportunities. That they 
dance and pray and murder and go to prison 
and Congress, the same as other folks, and 
have the same desires for entertainment. 

They of the cities can buy their shows, or 
rather the forms of amusement are every- 


94 


WED TO A DtJNATrC. 


where at hand, costing only the price of 
admission, whereas they of the country must 
manufacture their shows— in fact must be the 
show itself. So it comes about that in the 
country there are church sociables, drunks, 
parties, theatricals, etc., composed entirely of 
“home talent. No foreign “stars'’ to 
dazzle and confuse the audience. Occasion- 
ally the monotony is varied by the appearance 
of strolling minstrel troups, or the like, and it 
is the advertised appearance of a city 
theatrical party in our village to-morrow 
night that has wrought Mariah all up again, 
to say more of those awful things to me. 
Would you suppose she could, after all that 
you know I have been obliged to endure 
from her? 

Mariah could, and she did, but in justice to 
her I wish to state that I do not think her 
love of controversy, her 'desire to argue with 
me, was the prime motive in the present 
upheaval, but owing chiefly to what has 
been previously intimated, her insane 
persistency in clinging to old customs, 
determined to waddle along in the old 


ro A tUNATiC. 


95 


ruts, would not accept of advanced thought. 

Now in the case of this theatre company, 
Mariah positively refused to attend with me 
for the very silly reason that it was a variety 
show, composed principally of sky-kicking 
females. Such shows might furnish entertain- 
ment but were not instructive; contained 
nothing suggestive for after-thought; no food 
for intellectual reflection. 

Poor, deceived woman ! That vaudeville 
performance, if as advertised, was to be brim- 
ful and overflowing with charming sug- 
gestions. 

I resolved to make one more effort to get 
Mariah to attend, to lift her into modern 
channels, and that I might place the matter 
before her eyes in a more eloquent light I 
went to the village for the purpose of studying 
the play-bills and bulletin-boards. The 
bulletin-board in our place is the broadside of 
a fifty foot barn which stands exactly opposite 
the meeting house sheds. One standing in 
the rear of those sheds and gazing through 
the cracks between boards has an excellent 
opportunity of observing the bulletin-boards 


w^t) 1>0 A ttJNAl'iC. 


96 

without being himself observed. As soon as I 
could do so, without being noticed, I went 
behind the sheds. Not but what I would 
just as soon have stood directly in front of the 
barn, only by so doing I exposed myself to all 
kinds of interruption, which of course 
prevented concentration of thought and the 
comprehension of details. A great issue was 
at stake, and I was using every means to win. 

As I suddenly dodged behind the shed 
imagine my consternation on finding Thomas 
Plug there, also, comfortably seated and glar- 
ing with all his eyes right out through the 
very best crack in the whole shed towards the 
barn. I asked him if he had lost anything. 
He said he hadn’t, was simply trying to 
figure out what Tim Tank was up to out 
there in front of those pictures. I said I’d 
help figure out that problem if I could find a 
respectable crack to figure from, which I, 
with the aid of my knife, succeeded in finding. 
It was a very inferior crack in comparison to 
the one occupied by Mr. Plug, but it was 
better than none. Sure enough, there on an 
old barrel, not ten feet from the bulletin- 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


97 


boards, in plain sight of all, sat Tim Tank, 
lost in admiration of the gorgeously painted 
scenes before him. I said such unfettered 
liberty as Tim Tank availed himself of was 
really shocking. 

“Disgusting,” whispered Plug, and con- 
tinued. “ He’s been there for more than two 
hours, because he was there before you came 
here. ” 

But there he continued to sit, as happy, 
apparently, as some people in a prayer-meet- 
ing, staring at those illustrated girls. 
Daintily attired girls, if the illustrations were 
at all true to life. Girls who by some curious 
negligence had forgotten to don their winter 
clothing; also had omitted their summer 
suits, and probably thinking bloomers im- 
modest, had decided to wear nothing but a 
thing fastened about the hips that resembled a 
Japanese parasol in a simoon. Such superb 
limbs, and graceful bodies, and so. fascinating 
generally ! 

One entrancing creature — she was called 
oil the bills the “Queen of all Straddling 
Kickers” — was portrayed as bestowing a 


98 


W^D TO A LUNATIC. 


ravishing smile upon an enthralled audience. 
While one foot rested on the top of her head 
with the other she was making supremely 
graceful stabs at the moon. There the 
bewitching damsel posed, pioneer of striding 
civilization, in our benighted region. 

Plug and I had practically agreed that Tim 
Tank was a bad, low man, when my friend, 
Mr. Saphead, prematurely shot around the 
corner into our midst. He seemed to be 
surprised, but finally said he came back of the 
shed to watch Tim Tank look at the barn. 
I loaned him my knife to fix up the proper 
size of a crack to look through. At the 
present rate of increase it was only a question 
of a little time before there wouldn’t be enough 
cracks in the old shed to accommodate those 
respectable citizens who wished to gaze on 
Tim Tank, so I went home to try and impress 
the incorrigible Mariah that it was a duty she 
owed to me., to her children, to those gaiety 
girls, who were so nobly struggling to 
enlighten the world, to attend the theatre in 
company with her family. I discoursed as 
well as I knew on the sublimity of the 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


99 


performance ; its stimulating influence on the 
youth; its far-reaching suggestiveness. I 
told her the day of heavy dramatic work 
was passing away to make room for a higher 
order of things, and it was our duty to strive 
and keep pace with the procession, I assured 
her most solemnly that if she would go to 
that show with me I would keep a careful 
lookout and if there were to be any scenes 
enacted which might cause embarrassment to 
her backward nature, I would give warning 
in season that she might cover her face with 
her hands and she could peek out at the 
artists from between her fingers. By so doing 
she could gauge her observations to the 
amount she could digest. Gradually the 
space between the fingers could be widened 
and the dose increased. 

By an extremely agile movement on my 
part the water pitcher hit the cellar door 
instead of my head, and before I could pick 
up the broken pieces (of pitcher) Mariah was 
raving like a maniac. 

Did I suppose she, a wife and mother, 
would be seen at an entertainment of a 


13 


lOO 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


questionable order — at any place where she 
couldn’t, with pride, be accompanied by her 
son and daughter? To think the children 
had a father capable of suggesting such a 
thing and of wanting to go himself ! 

The entertainments indulged in, the books 
read, the recreations we permitted ourselves 
to enjoy, whether of the intellectual or animal 
order, became part and parcel of our nature. 
It was through the mind results were obtained. 
Should that mind be fed on sensualities or 
nourished by a quality of food that caused it 
to strive for greater attainments, expand? 
Did the portrayal of smut by books, theatres 
or society, purely for the sake of the smut, 
make better, greater manhood or lovelier 
womanhood? Did the breeding of intemper- 
ance and vice add beauty or elevation to 
beings whom God created in his own 
image? 

An entertainment might be amusing or 
instructive, or vulgar, or a combination of 
the three things, and set before the public for 
any or all of those purposes. Which should 
it be? 


TO k tUNATiC. 


lot 


Whatever the .public demanded, the public 
got. If it demands a book or a drama filled 
with indelicate hints, reeaking with all the 
vileness of human nature and atmospheres 
surging with legs, for no reason but to exhibit 
legs and the low contortions of thought, it 
got its desire. If it wanted plays, etc., 
depicting in strong light the woes and glories 
of life’s mysteries, using the unfortunate 
shadows thereof, only as a beacon to warn 
other travellers, it got that also. 

Who and what is the public? 

She and I were a small portion of it, and 
the sanction of our presence, our patronage 
of whatever was high or low, gave just, so 
much encouragement for the continuance of 
one or the other, good or bad. 

Why, of course people must have variety, 
and with all the innocent forms of amusement, 
the health-giving sports, the great intellectual 
treats afforded by literature, drama, music, 
art — certainly a rich variety — all within the 
grasp of those disposed to participate. 

Every heart manufactured its own idol. 
Should that idol be made of dirt or diamonds? 


102 


W^D TO A tWATIC, 


Madness ! 

I am not quite certain that madness is the 
proper ejaculation to use here, for as soon as 
Mariah cooled down sufficiently, so that I 
considered there was no danger of her making 
further physical assaults on me, I went to 
sleep, and consequently lost a considerable- 
portion of her exhortation. When I awoke 
she was gone. However, as the word madness 
can be appropriately applied to most of her 
savings, I am going to chance it here^ trust- 
ing that it fits exactly. Madness I 




WRECKS. 

]Sr confidence I am going to tell yoil some^ 
thing. Don^t lisp a word of it to anybody 
else, evetl if they do promise never to tell 
it, because the secret 1 am giving you, if 
rightly used and kept strictly in your 
charitable bosom, will increase your happiness 
tenfold; but once the receipt becomes 
generally known, its charm is lost forever. 

There is nothing in this wide world causes 
my angelic heart to thump with such un- 
allowed satisfaction as the misfortunes of 
other people^preferably my acquaintance. 

The proportion of enjoyment I derive from 
other’s troubles depends on the size of the 
calmity and how well I know the party afflicted. 




1 04 

For instance, if a person whom I have 
known for years runs against snags that just 
about ruins his earthly prospects, or at least 
knocks him out of the race for some time* 
When a case of that kind comes to my notice 
every pore of my magnificent being thrills with 
delight. Fact is, I am never real happy — " 
never experience that peace which corned only 
from perfect contentment, unless there is 
somebody in my immediate . vicinity in some 
kind of trouble. Troubles of a physical 
nature or honest financial failures, and the 
like, of course furnish me a mild form of 
happiness, but when the troubles arise which 
are destined under my careful treatment and 
aid to ruin somebody’s character, then do I 
become ecstatic. 

When I learned that friend Saphead was 
accused of crookedness in *sl money deal and 
rumor said there was going to be a wedding 
up at Felix’s, in which the sheriff was to act 
as groomsman, and that Thomas Plug’s 
oldest son was becoming intemperate, a 
delicate feast is spread for my epicurean 
fancies. 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


105 


And right here lies much of the beauty and 
power of the secret I am revealing to you, and 
the results depend largely on whether you 
manage now with tact or otherwise. Imitate 
my example in that respect. The first thing 
I do after hearing news of the above nature is 
to go to the barn or some secluded place and 
lie down and laugh and roll over and yell and 
hurrah and te-he until my feelings of hilarity 
are so far spent that I have myself under 
perfect control, and I briefly thank the Tord 
for creating me so honest, so pure and good, 
and then I am in condition to appear before 
the world. 

I then put on my very longest face — a face 
with several inches more of latitude than the 
one I use at funerals — and go out among my 
fellow-citizens and hark for information. It 
is a much better way to let your neighbor 
begin the talk, because that gives you such a 
chance to add helpful thought, seemingly 
innocent remarks, to the scandal. As for 
instance, when the Saphead money transaction 
is mentioned to me I roll back my eyes and 
say, “I can’t hardly — I don’t want to — it’s 


io6 


WED TO A LUNATIC, 


really a great strain on my credulity to believe 
it of him, and yet it may be so, because I 
knew of some things in connection with Mr. 
Saphead that were rather peculiar, etc. ” 

You want to have a very liberal supply of 
evidence and conjecture, either real or 
imagined, ready to substantiate the original 
yarn, and which will also make generous 
additions to the story. Of course I utter all 
of these extras in the “I understood,” or “so 
and so said” kind of way, which not only 
makes what I say more effective, but extends 
the impression that the news is breaking my 
heart, still all the time I am as tickled as 
tickled can be — internally. 

That rule will apply in a case like the 
Pelix wedding, only that needs a little more 
acting. Tet me rehearse it with you: You 
are supposed to have been through all the 
preliminary steps and are ready to begin at 
the critical point I tell you of the Pelixs. 
No, no, don’t snicker right out. I thought 
you said you were all ready to begin. Can’t 
you see by that snickering you are ridiculing 
the scandal — will kill it all together if you 


w:Ed to a lunatic. 


107 


don't conduct yourself more artfully. There, 
that’s better. In cases of this description, 
you must, if possible, roll your eyes entirely 
out of your head at this point. Pause a full 
minute, then exclaim in agonized tones, “w- 
wh-why-e-ee-e ! Pause again, and give the 
heavens a crack-splitting gaze of sadness and 
then gasp, “how could she?” Another 
pause, in which our deep emotions are becom- 
ing calm, recovering from the terrible shock, 
and we talk the matter over in a spirit of 
candor. I make a suggestion which at once 
reminds you of seeing a certain Miss lurking 
around a certain place when it was almost sun- 
down. That was several months ago,* and 
you didn’t think anything of it at the time — 
of course you didn’t, you darling old lump of 
innocence, but now, in the light of these awful 
developments what you saw is a shining 
circumstance — is the conclusive bit of 
evidence required in the glorious (?) affair. 

That’s right. You are catching hold of the 
idea beautifully, only you must practice the 
art of magnifying — brighten up the powers of 
originality a little. I never allow a story 


H 


io8 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


detrimental to any one’s character or prospects 
along any line to leave me as I heard it. I look 
it over carefully, study it from all its various 
bearings and tack on a little slur here, en- 
large the injurious points there, by several 
diameters ; at other points embellish the 
thing with plausible insinuations, (lies, 
Mariah calls them), and put the yarn again 
into circulation. 

In seasons when there is nothing special 
going by the way of gossip or slander or 
scandal, I have gratuitously furnished time 
and thought in ascertaining the weak points 
of certain people morally, or financially, or 
politically, and from the slimmest foundations 
of fact, constructed and made public incidents 
which well nigh ruined the parties involved, 
and afforded the community elegant topics 
for conversation. 

It’s a delightful past-time, that, but like all 
the fine arts, it requires culture to be 
successfully followed — cunning. 

But how do I manage to get all these things 
into general circulation, without implicating 
myself ? That is a very important point, yet 


WKD TO A TUNATIC. 


109 


one easy of performance. I always act under 
the head of anonymous. That is, after map- 
ing out in my mind every detail of the slander 
that I wish to put before the public. I tell you 
that Anonymous 2 told me that Anonymous 
I told him that there was terrible doings 
over yonder, and Anonymous i didn’t want 
the aforesaid news to become general gossip, 
so after adminstering a blood-curdling oath to 
Anonymous 2 to never, never tell it. 
Anonymous i tells Anonymous 2 and 
Anonymous 2 makes me take the oath of 
eternal secrecy, and tells me the horrible 
stuff, and I tell it to you just as soon as 
Anonymous 2 is out of hearing, with the 
solemn injunction that you mustn’t never tell 
it to anybody else ; but if you do tell it to 
others — ^of course you won’t tell it — tell it as 
big as it is, and tell whoever you tell that 
they mustn’t tell it, but if they must tell it, 
tell it large to those they tell, and tell them to 
tell it to those that they tell that they are in 
honor bound not to tell a word of it. 

Shameful how some folks will abuse a 
confidence of this kind ! 


no 


WKD TO A LUNATIC, 


You fail to see the object of all this ? After 
these vivid explanations you see no purpose. 
Your simplicity reminds me of Mariah ! 
Wrecks ! The creation of human wrecks is 
the plainly visible purpose I Take away the 
human wrecks that are scattered all along 
life's course and you take away much of the 
pleasure of your life and mine, because there 
is nothing that supplies the self-satisfying 
consolation as supplied by other people’s 
troubles. See them all around, everywhere, 
writhing under this burden and going down 
under that load — sinking never to rise I The 
high inspirations brought to the surface by a 
human wreck 1 You and I marching along 
so erect, so good, so smart, keeping clear 
from all perplexities, all wiles I 

Not only is this struggling mass of wreck- 
age a source of perpetual delight to you and I, 
but it also serves as a danger signal. Warns 
us of the bog-holes, the sunken reefs, and 
thereby we dodge many of the snares lying in 
the course. But the number of human wrecks 
would greatly diminish if it were not for our 
unceasing vigilance — possibly cease to exist — ' 


Wl^D ro A ttJNA^lC. 


Ill 


and then our leading amusement would be 
gone, and the compass Which has steered the 
craft be worthless. In such an event you and 
•1 might become wrecks, because there was 
nothing to guide us. 

So you will perceive, that as a matter of 
personal safty, it behooves us to be ever alert 5 
to labor with increased vigor. We can’t 
reasonably expect the l^ord is going to do all 
of this alone. Certainly not. There is a 
great work for us to perform, so let us all 
work together— reduce this wreck^making 
business to a system, to the accuracy of a 
science. In concert let us fabricate and gossip 
and slander and spy out and scandalize a 
fellow-being, until he, from sheer disgust 
with the pictured enormity of his crimes, 
gives up the battle and becomes really bad. 

It doesn’t make any difference how the 
result is achieved — only by some, by all, or 
by any means, I want the fellow wrecked, and 
then mark the next victim, proceed as before, 
and so continue piling wreck upon wreck. 
It’s a soul-tickling, body-nourishing, brain- 
enlarging, evil-preventing, joy-producing 


112 


wnv to A tUNAtIC. 


recreation to me, this manufacturing of wrecks 1 

“Buzzard!” 

It is perhaps needless for me to announce 
that Mariah has the floor now, and has 
already made her introductory preface. She 
looks pale, livid, and is saying, in a dis* 
connected, incoherent way, something about 
humanity and adversity, and me and snakes 
and brutes and people and down-falls and me 
and scorpions and afflictions and me and 
hyenas and folks and reverses, and me and 
hell-hags and loads and curses, and me and 
ghouls and visitations and clouds, and me and 
wire-worms, etc. Nearly two pages of just 
such meaningless stufl as that Mariah spoke, 
and then she groaned and said very distinctly, 
“Oh 1 how, could I ever have married such a 
man? ” 

And I groaned, and my groan for stone- 
melting pathos, heart-rending sorrow, and 
life-shortening propensities, was as much 
superior to Mariah’s groan as the Rocky 
Mountains are ahead of a hole in the grond. 

My groan said, “Oh! how, could I ever 
have married such a woman ?” 


CHAPTER THE TWEEFTH. 

POLITICS. 

fj'T may savor of conceit, but nevertheless I 
H' truly feel that there are concealed about 
^ my being all the qualifications necessary to 
the erection of a mammoth politician. Aye, 
that the making of a profound statesman, 
even, is wrapped up within me. 

My winsome ways — “to know me is to love 
me” — my wonderful capacity for believing 
without argument everything everybody says 
before election; my distinguished presence; 
my ability to drink with the thirsty or choke 
to death with the dry, and leave each party 
with the impression that I am all solid on the 
different forms of temperance; my unswerving 
integrity in places where unsophisticated pre- 


114 


WKD TO A I.UNAT1C. 


varications, coated over with wild fabri- 
cations, won’t do better; my vast stock of all 
kinds of principles, and the tact to apply the 
correct principle at the right time and place ; 
my unquestioned powers for grasping the 
money question — both the money and 
question— whether of gold or silver, or bills, 
or precious stones, in unlimited quantities, 
are a few of the minor qualities possessed by 
me, which entitle me to be ranked among the 
great politicians. 

Now as to my claims for statesmanship, the 
schemes I have recently evolved and perfected, 
whereby town, state and national life would 
receive tremendous impetus, are the grounds 
on which I justify my title to statesmanship. 

I maintain that such legislation should be 
enacted as would enable us to hang more 
people. Sadly deficient in that respect are 
our laws. Thousands of our citizens have 
gone to their graves, compartively unknown, 
simply on account of the narrowness of exist- 
ing laws. Thousands of these people — think 
of it — living and dying in obscurity, yet 
possessed of rare and tender talents ! Talents 


WED TO A. DUNATIC. 


II5 

that under laws of wide justice would have 
allowed the possessor thereof to have won 
lasting fame as the leading character on a 
well constructed gallows. And not only fame 
have these uncomplaining heroes lost by 
being compelled to die a natural death, but 
volumes of sentiment and armfuls of bouquets, 
these cruel laws have deprived them of, 
as well. 

After this waning hanging industry had 
been raised to the position its importance 
demands, and in successful operation three 
years, I w’ould bring about such legislation as 
would create Uncle Sam owner of this land, 
bag and baggage, in reality, as well as in 
name, and each individual to get his or her 
little plate of beans from Uncle Sam’s own 
hand — the number of beans each was to 
receive depending entirely upon the benefits 
each had contributed towards the good of the 
whole. By this system, our life, which is 
now composed of swine, murderers, thieves 
and idiots, would gradually all turn to 
idiots — but so happy and contented idiots we 
all should be. 


15 


WKD TO A LUNATIC. 


1 16 

As soon as these great plans were complete 
in my own mind, I at once set to work to get 
myself into a position where a nation might 
reap the benefits of my studies, and that is the 
sole reason for my so rashly thrusting my life 
into political waters. But being a wise states- 
man requires one shade of brain, and scooping 
in the necessary votes for an election to the 
office w^hich makes a statesman wise or other- 
wise — mostly otherwise — demands a brain of 
all colors and adaptabilities. 

My first step towards being elected a legis- 
lator was to worm myself into the good graces 
of Tim Tank, though Tim does not wield a 
mighty influence in the social and religious 
life in my district, yet as a political factor he 
is a power. Once I gained his hearty support 
I was sure of the support of all the dram- 
drinking voters, regardless of party, for Tim 
is their avowed leader. I arranged a fishing 
expedition to the river, to be composed 
entirely of rum and Tim and I. Tim was a 
little shy of me at first, naturally supposing I 
belonged to the temperance party, but as we 
fished and drank and drank and fished, I 


W:BD To A TUNATIC. 


117 

Unfolded to Tim the beauties of my projects 
once the office was mine. Before night I had 
convinced Tim that in less than one year from 
the time of my election pure whiskey would 
run in that river in the place of water, and 
everybody could drink free. of charge, and he 
promised me the votes of himself and noble 
compatriots. 

I had indeed won a great victory, but when 
returning home that night we met Thomas 
Plug, and he caused to be put into circulation 
that I had been fishing with Tim Tank and 
came home in a maudlin condition, which of 
course created an uproar among my 
temperance supporters, and to pacify that 
element I conducted temperance meetings in 
several localities. 

I told several people how I had been 
scandalized, what a stanch advocate, both by 
example and precept, I. had always been of 
the holy cause of temperance; how if these 
nice people should deem it best to elect me to 
office, I should, as soon as consistent with the 
circumstances, cause all the intoxicants of 
whatever name in the United States, to be 


WSD TO A LUNATIC, 


Il8 

destroyed fire, and the makers and sellers 
thereof to be cast into the middle of the wild 
roaring sea. 

My temperance speeches made a great hit, 
I had nearly regained all the ground lost in 
consequence of that malicious lie, when my 
character was assailed from another point. 

It appeared in evidence that precisely one 
hour and thirty-six minutes after I passed 
Mrs. Plump’s residence, she was seen peering 
out of a window, smiling expectantly in the 
direction I had gone, from which the story 
was manufactured and widely circulated that 
the aforesaid lady and myself were planning 
to elope, and from that the absurd inference 
was drawn that I was. a bad lot, anyhow, and 
to support me for office was to put a premium 
on immorality. 

While I was proving to the public that 
although I was a large man in every respect, 
my character towered majestically above all 
my other desirable qualities, a rumor was set 
in motion that I was the originator and 
founder of the A. P. A. Order, which, to 
prevent its costing me the entire Roman vote. 


WED 1^0 A lUNAIPIC. 


ttg 


eaused me to become immediately a membet 
of the Catholic church. 

This hasty and ill-advised action came neat 
ruining my political prospects, for before I 
again entered the good graces of the A. P, 
A’s I was obliged to unite with nine churches 
of different denominations and seven secret 
societies ; but every new church or society t 
joined some other church or society was sure 
to be offended, yet I think I manipulated the 
religious and society votes with such skill 
that on the whole I was a gainer thereby. 

It was also intimated that I was lazy and 
unscholarly, and therefore was not worthy of 
the people’s suffrage. To countermand this 
vile insinuation during the remainder of the 
campaign I carried in some conspicuous place 
when in agricultural communities, a hoe, an 
ax and a barn shovel, and I discoursed to 
them on tuberculosis in turnips, and the 
goneness of calves dieted on skimmed-milk. 

I told th'e farmers in glowing terms how 
they were the salt and sugar and saleratus 
and nobility of the earth, and if it hadn’t been 
for the very deplorable circumstance of the 


120 


W^D TO A ttlNATlC, 


Lord’s calling me to work great reformations 
I should have certainly been a tiller of bull- 
thistles and hens. (Here I made some 
graceful flourishes with my farming imple- 
ments). I promised them, if elected, to 
introduce such legislation as would at the end 
of six months’ time, under penalty of death, 
prohibit the making or selling or causing to 
be manufactured and sold any and all buffalo- 
flies, potato-bugs, or grass-hoppers. In the 
more cultured places might be seen pro- 
truding from my pockets copies of Milton’s 
Poetical Works and a Sallustiaa Catilina et 
Jugurtha, and in my speeches I told this class 
that on their votes, on my election, depended 
the propagation of — — “ me-kingdom *’ for- 
a-book—^and they believed it. 

Meantime the illiterate voters had been 
informed that I was opposed to free silver. 
As that class could neither read or write, I 
Was obliged to see each in person and tell 
them how grossly my money views had been 
misrepresented; how if they could stoop to 
honor me with their votes, in the very near 
future, government teams, loaded with silver 


WBD TO A LUNATIC. 


I2I 


dollars, would pass that way daily and every 
man, woman and child could take out a ten- 
quart-panful of dollars, apiece, each day, 
which statement was at once, by the 
intelligent voters, construed to illustrate my 
extreme ignorance of the money question. 

In spite of all these things — in spite of the 
rum — many estimable citizens had drank at 
Mariah’s and my expense; in the face of all 
the rich promises I had made of every form of 
beneficial legislation and valuable appoint- 
ments ; in view of the logical arguments I 
had given vent to, affecting all sides of all 
current questions; notwithstanding my 
magnetic capacity for straddling fences; in 
spite of my sublime purity of character and 
deep religious convictions, an adverse current 
was setting in against me, which, if nothing 
was done to stay or reverse, doomed my 
political aspirations. 

The impression seemed to be gaining ground 
that I was a drunkard and a temperance fanatic, 
a religious crank and a howling infidel, a 
many-sided political monstrosity, in whose 
hands the country was destined to certain ruin. 


122 


WED TO A DUNATIC. 


For a man who had cast self wholly aside 
and recklessly flung himself upon the altar 
of liberty, a sacrifice for humanity, to first 
realize that his labors for that same humanity, 
nobody else, being made the subject of scorn 
and question, is a saddening, maddening, 
body-tuckering, profanity-breeding, brain- 
clotting sensation to the victim. 

In truth I can. say, at this stage of the 
campaign, I should have given up the fight if 
nothing but my personal interests had been 
concerned, but my devouring love for my 
constituency, my firm desire to elevate them, 
my thorough conviction that only through the 
medium of myself could their condition be 
improved, forced me to continue the struggle. 

I went into council with Tim Tank, and 
after surveying the field with great care, 
considering all the possibilities and proba- 
bilities, we decided there was only two things 
more that could be done to aid in my election, 
and even then my success was doubtful, so 
abominably had I been lied about. 

Our first plan was to send to a foreign 
country and import a few hundred voters, but 


w^:d to a lunatic. 


123 


more careful consideration convinced us of the 
impracticability of that scheme, owing to the 
nearness of the election. It was found, on 
consulting the time-tables of ocean steamers, 
and making no allowance for accidents or 
delays, the foreigners wouldn’t have but just 
one hour’s time from reaching port to the 
closing of the polls to become naturalized, 
study our literature, art and constitution, and 
learn how to make their mark on the ballot. 
Such undue haste was decidedly distasteful to 
my refined nature, so that scheme was 
abandoned. 

The accomplishment of the other plan, was 
more within our reach — more in accordance 
with my high ideals of political warfare. 
Tim agreed to arrange such a line of circum- 
stances that several men who had been 
specially active against me should prematurely 
die. Their death in connection with some 
judicious hints made to other parties, we 
thought, would greatly strengthen my vote. 
So it did, but I was defeated. Yet I firmly 
believed, had that same plan been adopted 
earlier in the canvass I should have been 


6 


124 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


elected with an overwhelming majority. The 
inspirations incident to five murdered men 
had not time o permeate the public bosom and 
work out its true effect — the correct result 
for me. 

As showing the manly fortitude with which 
I bore defeat and still labored for the welfare 
of our community, to my eternal credit be it 
said, it was my volunteered and candid 
testimony that secured the arrest and 
conviction of Tim Tank, and for his (?) 
henious crimes, seven months later, his life 
paid the full penalty. 

“Oh! this is too hideous to believe, even 
of you,” gasped Mariah, and she fainted 
dead away. 

Really, I never supposed that woman had 
my interests so at heart. 


CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. 


SUNDRIES. 

5|!tOW beautiful the snow, how cosy the fire 
W on the hearth, how transcendently lovely 
^ the full-grown blizzard, rolling along so 
majestically, how invigorating the frosty 
mornings, how absolutely entrancing is every- 
thing and anything that pertains to winter, 
are the gushing thoughts that rise up in your 
cranium and mine as we swelter in the 
summer heat. But alas ! the fickleness of 
human nature ! When our noses and ears 
are frost-bitten and our brows are being 
fanned by stinging zephyrs fresh from the 
Esquimaux maiden’s fair cheek, and we are 
stuck fast in a snow drift, it occurs to us that 
there is really no earthly comfort outside of 


126 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


perspiration and large black flies, and that 
to hear the father of all mosquitoes singing his 
favorite hymn, and to feel his pearly teeth 
nibbling our flesh, would be paradise. 

Funny, isn’t it, you and 1 never got into a 
position yet but we wanted to get somewhere 
else in order to be perfectly happy. It must 
be the fault of this world ; still Mariah has 
told me repeatedly in private that this was 
the very best world I should ever get into 
unless there was a radical change in my mode 
of living. 

There it is again, you and I are all right, 
and so is Mariah, in our respective minds, but 
there is wide diversity of opinion in those 
minds and in the deductions whereby we have 
arrived at certain conclusions. There is a 
mighty discrepancy. Who appointed you 
or I or Mariah umpire in this case ? 

You and I are all right when we can have 
hash when we want it, but the trouble is we 
don’t get that dish set before us until our 
craving for hash is all gone by and we have 
on a hankering for pea-soup. Then hash is 
disgusting. If you and I and Mariah could 


W35D TO A tUNATlC. 


127 


Only be in some place we are not in, how 
great, how good we should be. By some 
strange freak in this little arrangement we 
are not in those positions, and so while 
millionaires are refusing to found colleges in 
heathen lands and establish missionary 
stations in the centres of civilization, you and 
I continue to work off decayed cabbage at the 
ministerial donations and warrant spavined 
horses sound. 

You and I and the other fellow, so far as 
pure goodness or genuine badness are con- 
cerned, stand on the same level, yet we must 
in honesty admit he has the advantage of us 
in the matter of brains. Still we, you and I 
and he, are all making use of our different 
sized and different numbered talents— not one 
of the lights has been stuck under a bushel 
and not a talent or a fraction of a talent has 
been buried. 

Whether the use we put those things to 
produce white wings on the shoulders, or 
scraggly horns from the head, or something 
else awaits us, are questions we have 
preached and sung and philosophized and 


128 


W^D TO A tUNATIC. 


Speculated over for ages, and in regard to 
which we are just as wise as at the start, no 
wiser so far as positive knowledge is con- 
cerned; but it is a fact possible of mathe- 
matical demonstration that if certain teachings 
uttered near two thousand years ago, were 
universally followed, hell would be geo- 
graphically beyond the borders of this 
earth. 

Well, we have intended to do some 
marvelously fine things but something bobbed 
up and smashed our grand intentions into 
splinters, so that what we actually did, though 
still marvelous, was a great ways from 
being fine. 

Now when I began this work I had in mind 
an elaborate plot to write into a novel. 
There was of course to be a deep, subtile 
lesson running through the romance, yet so 
nicely woven into the characters’ lives as to 
be only pleasantly susceptible to the reader* 

There was to have been Katie, the heroine, 
a girl of sky-blue color and curly ears and 
glossy brown hair and pimply fingers, who, 
after repeated solicitations from Charlie, at 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


129 


last tumbles right into love with Charlie. 
Charlie was a good fellow of the place and 
would have made any good woman a husband, 
but in the meantime Jack, the all-around 
tough, has got into love with Katie and 
urges her to flee with him to the minister’s, 
but while she is studying whether it shall be 
Jack or Charlie, Jack washes his feet, which 
causes him to take a severe cold, and sixty- 
seven years later he dies. But before the 
occurrence of that happy event, Katie and 
Charlie become re-engaged, Katie having 
wisely decided that a poor living husband 
was better than a good dead one, and Charlie 
having pledged himself by all the powers 
great and small never, never to take a bath. 

That, in brief is the synopsis of one of the 
most intricate pieces of fiction a long sufler- 
ing world ever escaped. As the thing was 
mapped out in my mind, I have no hesitation 
in saying that from its beginning through to 
the thrilling though sad denouement, the 
acute character delineations, the rich des- 
cription of places and customs, the accurate 
portrayal of life in its various phases, all 


130 


W^D TO A LUNATIC. 


written in my fascinating, graceful style, 
should have made the work very rare. 

But please observe, before I had completed 
the first chapter Mariah tuned up on that old, 
old theme, “Marriage,” and in deference to 
her wishes I decided to picture some of the 
bright lights and coal-black shadows of 
matrimony, using the above outlined plot as 
the groundwork, as before. 

Well, I had the new arrangement fairly 
under way, when I was again rudely inter- 
rupted by Mariah on the subject of “Work,” 
and to preserve peace and keep our household 
furniture in a saleable condition, I was again 
obliged to change the idea, but still I thought 
I could use the main features of the original 
plot in a story depicting country life. 
With that end in view I diligently studied Agri- 
cultural Reports and had got so I could mix 
up love scenes with the cultivation of the 
stately sun-flower, the country prayer-meeting 
with the fanning of mild-eyed cows with 
milking stools — got so I could mix those 
things delightfully, and Mariah broke loose 
on Religion. 


WED TO A DUNATIC. 


13I 

It was going to be as I feared, no use in 
trying further to pursue a definate plan in the 
work. Better go at these old antiquated, 
fossiliferous topics, haphazard and close them 
out, so that if I survived the ordeal my 
future attemps would be free from such 
nonsense. But I did not abandon my 
cherished project easily, without first trying 
to discover some means by which I could 
carry out my first inspirations. 

There was only one practical solution to 
the question and that was to swap Mariah for 
another Mariah. If I could get hold of a 
Mariah possessed of all of my present Mariah’s 
virtues without having any of her failings, 
the world might yet receive the benefit of my 
lofty plans. With that object in view I 
looked around amongst the Mariahs. There 
was Mariah Plug, who always appeared 
pleasant and smiling in my presence, and 
whom, so far as I knew, was not given to 
argument. She, I thought, was the Mariah 
for me. I was just at the point of suggesting 
negotiations of Mariahs with Mr. Plug, when 
it occurred to me that Mariah Plug had no 


17 


132 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


money in her own name. The thought spoiled 
that trade for me. I couldn’t possibly get 
along with a Mariah that didn’t have money. 
Curious but I considered twelve different 
Mariahs and in each case I was almost certain 
that I had at last found the correct Mariah, 
when, just at the fatal moment, just as I was 
to consumate the swap of Mariahs, I would 
learn that this Mariah had a glass eye and 
that Mariah was a pugilist, and another 
Mariah was nothing but mouth and tongue, 
and so it proved with all those Mariahs. 

Come to know them, each had as many and 
most of them more and worse imperfections 
than my Mariah. I gave up in despair. I 
must stick to and jaw with my own Mariah 
through all this rubbish, until the climax was 
reached in Politics, when I think Mariah also 
gave up in despair. And here you have the 
disorted remains of what were at the start the 
very highest intentions. 

After all it signifies nothing, for it is 
written; Man is of few days and his nights 
are variable. He entereth the world and he 
snorteth. He draweth forth from a bottle the 


WED TO A LUNATIC. 


133 


wherewith of life, until, by the swelling of his 
gums, he yelleth, and the father thereof, at 
such an hour as the moon is at its zenith, and 
the bull-frog singeth not, ariseth up, going to 
and fro with him that sweareth for teeth, and 
long and deep is his wail as he thinks of the 
Hymenean vows. Time -tarrieth not, teeth 
appear, and he walketh among his fellow- 
citizens clad in knee-breeches, and his 
garment pockets, from insufficiency of size, 
fail to accommodate several billion of different 
sundry, various and miscelleanous articles, 
both old and new, garnered from a multitudi- 
nous assortment. He weepeth, for his soul is 
sore vexed. His mind soareth after knowledge 
and he proceedeth to institutions of learning, 
but the master therein cheweth his ear. 

Verily, life is darkness. 

He entereth his fourteenth summer, and 
behold his neighbor’s daughter is comely and 
fair to look upon. 

He goeth up to that neighbor’s house and 
the daughter yeaeth, but the head of the 
household loometh up and nayeth with the 
might of both feet. 


134 


WKD TO A I^UNATIC. 


He goeth abroad in the earth and cleaveth 
unto rectitudes not perpendicular. His soul 
assumeth a grasping hue, and he claweth in 
diverse places for gold, but others are also 
clawing, and behold the beings are full of 
experiences and he sinketh upon his back a 
minus quantity financially. 

He desireth to serve his country, and 
aspireth, but his friends are not of the 
majority, and it is discovered that in his 
youth he was very wicked. 

He draweth his feet up under him and 
forgeteth to breathe and the neighbors gather 
thereabout and marvel right out loud of the 
man’s many virtues and dazzling brilliancy, 
but he is not of the earth, and his ears listen 
not to earthly jabber. 

Many there be who travel in roads strewn 
with fine gravel stones, and whereby the 
stately mullein stalk rears its graceful 
plumage, and the dashing hornet trills sweet 
melodies and warbleth his bit, but they are 
not of the majority. 

And so time, and I, and you, and Mariah 
move along. 


WED TO A EUNATIC. 


135 


Nothing in my life for two years past to 
remind me of those sweet days agone, when 
Mariah declared in resonant whispers, that I 
was the best, the greatest, the only — but why 
repeat it — I was the universe in short, except- 
ing when a thunder storm is in progress, then 
she flies to my arms and nestles, and coos and 
WOOS, with the old-time emphasis. 

Mariah don’t know to this day but what I 
have concealed in the hollow of my hand all 
the thunder and lightning going and can 
cause the stuff to obliterate her any moment 
I wish. 

Please not misuse my confidence by inform- 
ing her of the true nature of thunder and 
lightning, or who controls it. Once she 
learns the true facts in the matter, my only 
weapon for reducing Mariah to proper sub- 
jection is gone. My only means of finding 
out whether she loves me or not is destroyed. 
The only link which binds Mariah and I and 
the past will be broken. 

You cannot, you will not be so heartless as 
to tell her. 


NO MORE. 



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